Simon Mcdonnell Email & Phone Number

New York, United States

New York, New York, US

• Primary focus: housing & urban policy support & data management at state. COVID-19 related funds & NYS Climate Act
• Working with the Commissioner & Executive Team, leads a team in developing centralized research & analytic capacity across multiple programmatic areas in NYSHCR; work includes supporting existing staff & developing new.
• Manages the Office of Research & Strategic Analysis (ORSA), including staff allocation & recruitment to specific projects, managing project timelines and deliverables, and coordinating with stakeholders & leadership.
• Our team brings improved analyses of administrative/external data, & more efficient/accurate reporting structures to support internal & external stakeholder decision-making (including State’s House NY goal of 100,000.
• Works with internal programs (e.g. SONYMA, Section 8, Office of Rent Administration, Tenant Protection Unit, Office of Fair Housing), as well as other governmental stakeholders (e.g. NYSERDA), to identify and answer.
• Provides leadership quantitative & policy support in program set-up and administration related to COVID recovery efforts funded by federal CARES/ARPA funds; including federally required needs assessments, policies &.

• Recruited from GOSR to establish ORSA group supporting Commissioner & executive decision-making. Manage research & data science team to develop reporting tools, ad hoc & longer-term research, & quantitatively.
• Analytic lead for statewide rent stabilization law (HSTPA 2019). Developed tracking tools for NYS’s House NY goal of 100k affordable units by 2022. Lent quantitative support to Department of Labor (unemployment.
• Acted as analytic advisor to FIX NYC Commission on Congestion Pricing, launched in February 2018.

• Primary focus: recovery & resiliency policy at state and federal level; infrastructure, land use/housing, and CDBG-DR policy.
• Established and led Research & Strategic Analysis group (10 quantitative & GIS researchers). Part of shared services/communication; Led data/analytic support reporting directly GOSR Executive Director and executive team.
• Policy development and led federal reporting for NYS’s Community Development Block Grant – Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) NYS’s $4.5 billion allocation. Recruited, managed, and mentored researcher team and associated.
• Analytic lead for NYS’s waiver to HUD; subsequently granted (largest disaster recovery waiver ever granted by HUD); led analytic support for NYS’s aid to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria (2017).

• Conducted strategic analyses for NYS Housing Commissioner on economic impacts of resilience investments.
• Led large Benefit-Cost Analysis for the NYS’s National Disaster Resilience Competition application to HUD focusing on the impact of an $800 million investment in the State’s resilient infrastructure. Managed.
• Project lead for barriers to spending of NYS’s $4.5 billion allocation; successful waiver request to federal government.
• Managed $1.2 million SUNY Rockefeller Institute of Government research contract; led development of conferences.

• Supported programs and the overall organization in addressing ad hoc and ongoing policy and data questions.
• Project lead for the Two-Year Anniversary of Superstorm Sandy Report; launched by the New York Governor Cuomo.
• Project lead/lead author of NYS Unmet Needs analysis for NYS's Action Plan Amendments for HUD's CDBG-DR funding.

New York, NY, US

• Primary focus: housing & land use policy, urban, economic & labor market impacts of CUNY in New York City/State.
• Project manager: quantitatively understanding relationships between student residential characteristics and educational outcomes. Focused on -o Hurricane Sandy: identified 17,000 students in surge zone; developed.
• Conduct project identification, planning, development, economic analysis, review, and stakeholder engagement. Manage a cross-functional team of policy analysts (ranging from 1-4) leading implementation and review.
• Managed external consultants for a series of cost-benefit, cost-effectiveness, and labor market outcome analyses related to CUNY’s ASAP program – recently granted $35 million by Mayor’s Office.
• Leading CUNY’s official response to the Federal Department of Education College rating scheme.Exploring the characteristics that influence retention and graduation rates for baccalaureate and associate level students.

New York, New York, US

• Primary focus: transportation and climate change policy related to city housing and land use goals and policies.
• Project manager for the center’s land use suite of projects; overseeing strategy and policy development; Led internal meetings, outreach to stakeholders (e.g. policymakers, officials etc.); organized conferences and.
• Led a team of economic and legal researchers (2-10) and developed quantitative models of New York City’s urban environment and policy interventions, focused on rezonings and parking policies;o Led team in assembling.

• Primary focus: climate change goals related to sustainable transportation, energy and development.
• Project manager: developed and modeled European climate change and energy policies. Organized meetings and seminars between academics, stakeholders and other policy players.
• Guest Editor: led the development of a special edition of the international, peer-reviewed journal, Energy Policy.

Chicago, IL, US

• Primary focus: environmental and transportation planning and policy.
• Modeled land use, climate change, and transportation policies in Chicago (Bus Rapid Transit in the city and the emissions and land use impacts of biodiesel penetration in US rail freight). o Presented and published.
• Taught graduate-level environmental & microeconomics; 2 classes of 20-30 graduate students.
• Established graduate-level exchange program between students in UIC and in University College Dublin (UCD), including course coordination & the adoption of an associated Memorandum of Understanding.

• Received funding from the Government of Ireland through its research arm (The Irish Research Council for Humanities and the Social Sciences) for PhD studies.
• Managed execution of large-scale transportation survey of residents near a proposed Bus Rapid Transit route.
• Course organizer and lecturer for freshman cohorts of 300 students focused on the economics of sustainability and corporate social responsibility.

Phd, Environmental/Transport Economics

Master Of Science (Msc), Planning And Environmental Policy