One program, NEXUS, brought 24 high-performing students of color to the Greater Philadelphia area for two weeks over the summer to expose them to commercial real estate for the first time. Additionally, the Developing Leaders Mentorship Program, a group selected through a competitive application process, participated in a 10-month program focused on their professional development, sessions with industry leaders, and tours of high-profile projects.

“We recognize that so many students have many conceptions of what their career should be prior to even entering college,” Gilchrist says, noting that NAIOP “really kind of increased our focus on diversity and inclusion, increased our focus on growing a young cohort of future leaders in the business.”

NAIOP Greater Philadelphia's 2019 president, Lauren Gilchrist, the first woman elected to the post, presenting at a recent Urban Land Institute conference at the Union League Club, Philadelphia, PA (Steve Lubetkin Photo/State Broadcast News)

The chapter is guided by a board of directors including executives from Liberty Property Trust, Brandywine Realty Trust, Keystone Property Group, PREIT, Linden Lane Capital Partners, JLL, Cushman & Wakefield, Newmark, and several other professional service firms.

More recently, Gilchrist has become involved with policy initiatives.

“Advocacy will be a big part of my focus over the course of the next year in particular, especially as the 10-year tax abatement in Philadelphia continues to be hotly debated in City Council,” she says. So that will be a big focus of our work in the winter and spring of 2019. The 10-year tax abatement is really the most important economic development policy in Philadelphia history, when it comes to our ability to not only build buildings, but also then to attract tenants at rates that make sense in the city of Philadelphia, vs. some of our outlying and competing suburbs. It often gets positioned as being something that only benefits Center City. But the fact of the matter is that the abatement corrects for a market failure to provide adequate housing office and retail space where demand already exists, and the demand exists in Center City.”

In the coming year, Gilchrist and the NAIOP board will prioritize building a local-level advocacy program.

“The Philadelphia chapter has been one of the fastest growing in the country and made great strides representing our industry on the issues affecting our business, while preparing our young leaders for success,” says Mark Seltzer, vice president at Liberty Property Trust and immediate past president of NAIOP Philadelphia, who will remain active on the board of directions and chair the executive committee. “The commercial real estate community is becoming increasingly diverse and progressive and we are excited to be leading this effort and shaping the future of our industry in the Greater Philadelphia region. The experience that new leadership, Lauren and Joe bring to NAIOP will carry the organization into a new, even more productive era.”