Diane Sterner

Ms. Sterner serves as Director of Community Strategies at New Jersey Community Capital. Ms. Sterner joined New Jersey Community Capital in August 2013 as Community Strategies Advisor to devise new ways for NJCC to help local communities develop effective revitalization approaches, as well as identify resources to implement them. The Community Strategies team that she has put in place helps community developers and municipalities in New Jersey pursue both comprehensive community development and local systems change in New Jersey communities, through data-driven community research and assessment, local policy development, and broad based revitalization planning and implementation.

Prior to joining NJCC, Ms. Sterner served for 23 years as founding executive director of the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey. During that time, she built one of the strongest associations of community based development organization in the country, enhancing the capacity of such organizations to create housing and economic opportunities and revitalize communities. As a James A. Johnson Fellow in 2006, Ms. Sterner also helped found the National Alliance of Community Economic Development Associations (NACEDA) as a voice for community development practitioners at the national level and as a vehicle for bringing together state and local CDC associations to support the field. Her contributions have greatly strengthened the community development sector in New Jersey and nationally, and helped bring about state-level policy reforms critical to urban and lower-income communities.

Diane has served on the Board of Trustees of a number of organizations, including the National Housing Institute, New Jersey Policy Perspective, NACEDA, and New Jersey Citizen Action, and was a founding board member of the New Jersey Community Loan Fund (now NJCC.) She has a Bachelor’s degree in Spanish from Kalamazoo College and an MSW from Rutgers University Graduate School of Social Work.