Housing After Dark Episode 17: Jonathan Fearn on the Monoculture of Development, Social Housing, and Aligning Policy and Industry

Jonathan Fearn is someone I’ve gotten to know slowly over the past five years the old fashioned way—by seeing him at housing events. Jonathan is a Senior Vice President of Real Estate Development at Oakland’s own Signature Development Group, where his day job is to build buildings, most of which are for people to live in. But for me, and I imagine many of you listening in, Jonathan is someone known for what he calls his “extracurriculars”—serving on public committees and non-profit boards across the Bay Area. He’s never the loudest person in the room, even when he’s on stage, but when you look at his list of accomplishments and the places where he shows up, you’ll realize how quietly important a person like Jonathan is to moving all of Bay Area housing forward. It’s an honor to have him on the show, and I hope you enjoy our wide-ranging conversation on everything from the interconnectedness of the housing economy to social housing.

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