Ashley Williams Clark is the Vice President of Detroit Future City (DFC) and the Director of the Center for Equity, Engagement and Research (the Center). In this role, Ashley leads and manages the Center’s work with a focus on promoting economic equity in Detroit through evidence-based research, policy recommendations, and engaging Detroit residents and community leaders to understand and utilize DFC research.

Ashley has more than 15 years of experience in public policy research and analysis, community engagement, program development, and project management. Prior to joining DFC, Ashley worked for the City of Detroit’s Housing and Revitalization Department on the public-private partnerships team. She also served as the director of outreach and strategic partnerships at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Charlotte Urban Institute, a non-partisan, applied research and community outreach institute. While at the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute, Ashley also was the interim and associate director of an integrated data system and led the Institute’s research and community engagement initiatives that addressed affordable housing and homelessness. Ashley previously held joint roles at the Urban Institute in Washington D.C. as a research associate on the Metropolitan Housing and Communities team and as the director of operations for the Urban Institute Academy for Public Policy Analysis and Research, a training and mentoring program aimed at training and cultivating a diverse pipeline of public policy scholars from historically underserved communities (now a separate non-profit called The Policy Academies).

For her work, Ashley was recognized with Corp!’s Most Valuable Professional Award, UNC Charlotte’s award for Employee of the Year for Community and Public Service, recognized in Who’s Who in Black Charlotte,  and nominated for the State of North Carolina Governor’s Awards for Excellence. Her research on evictions in Mecklenburg County earned the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership G. Thomas Kingsley Impact award.

Ashley has a master’s degree in city and regional planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a bachelor’s degree in urban studies from Washington University in St. Louis. She is a member of Leadership Detroit Class 43 – the best class ever!