CLEVELAND, Ohio — After a national search, the Cleveland Foundation stayed in Northeast Ohio to find its chief impact officer.
The Foundation announced Wednesday that it has hired Joyce Pan Huang, currently the director of city planning for Cleveland, for the newly created role. Huang will join the Foundation in January.
“Joyce is an extraordinary, nationally recognized leader with an impressive track record advancing transformative, community-centered impact,” Lillian Kuri, Cleveland Foundation president and CEO, said in a statement. “Joyce’s expertise paired with her deep respect and understanding for the experiences of community residents will drive progress toward our vision of a vibrant Northeast Ohio where no Clevelander is left behind.”
In a news release, the Foundation says Huang “will lead efforts to create a unified vision and direction that will elevate the Foundation as a trusted partner and catalyst for transformative change in Cleveland.”
Huang was hired as city planning director in January 2022 by Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb. Prior to that, she had been vice president of community development at the nonprofit MidTown Cleveland Inc. While with MidTown, Huang helped to formulate the area’s new master plan, designed to hasten the evolution of a busy but drab 85-block area between downtown and the Cleveland Clinic into a complete, healthy neighborhood.
She also organized a neighborhood strategy for Asiatown, just north of Midtown, that included hiring the first-ever team of multi-lingual planners of Asian descent to oversee the expansion of planning and neighborhood services in an area populated by immigrants from China, Vietnam, and Korea.
She’s a native of Penfield, New York, a suburb of Rochester, and was the first woman to hold the city’s planning director post, the first mother, and the first Asian-American. She played a key role in Bibb’s 15-minute city initiative, Complete and Green Streets, as well as a pilot for a new zoning code that fosters sustainable development patterns across Cleveland neighborhoods.
“I strongly believe that people-centered investments and relationship-building are essential for dynamic and growing communities,” Huang said in a statement. “As the Cleveland Foundation expands its critical work in place-based philanthropy, I am eager to leverage my expertise in city planning and community development to make positive, lasting change for the residents of Greater Cleveland.”