Leslie Woo, Jury Chair
Chief Executive Officer, CivicAction
Ontario, Canada

Leslie Woo is a respected leader with over 25 years of experience building sustainable communities and shaping urban growth in Canada’s fastest-growing urban region, the Greater Toronto Area. Woo recently assumed the role of CEO at CivicAction, a premier civic engagement organization that convenes established and rising leaders from all sectors, backgrounds, and experiences, CivicAction catalyzes actions and impactful solutions to address barriers to inclusion in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area and beyond. Before joining CivicAction, Woo was at Metrolinx for over a decade, including her time as Metrolinx’s Chief Planning and Development Officer. She is a trisector athlete with experience in the public, private, and not-for-profit sectors. She is an experience a planner, architect, and community activator. An accomplished leader, Woo was named one of Canada’s Top 100 Most Powerful Women in 2017 by WXN, Spacing Toronto’s Transit Changemaker in 2016, and Canada’s Women’s Infrastructure Network’s 2015 Outstanding Leader. Founder of shebuildscities.org, Woo uses her voice and platform to amplify and celebrate other women city builders.

Candace Damon
Vice Chairman, HR&A Advisors
Brooklyn, NY, USA

Candace is Vice Chairman of HR&A Advisors, Inc. She has over 35 years of experience in the management of complex, public-private real estate and economic development activity in cities across North America. Her specific areas of expertise include supporting master planning efforts for large-scale revitalizations, ensuring the long-term viability of urban open space, leading organizational planning for non-profits and institutions, addressing the financial challenges of making commercial and multifamily residential buildings energy efficient, and providing strategic direction for downtown and waterfront redevelopment.  She points with particular pride to the design of what remains the country’s largest and most successful effort to invest in energy efficiency in affordable housing – New York State’s Affordable Multifamily Program, which ultimately provided a mix of technical assistance and investment capital to 100,000 units across the state – and to a host of new and revitalized urban parks that operate on a financially sustainable basis because of her and her colleagues’ work, including Charlotte’s Romare Bearden Park, Brooklyn Bridge Park, and (soon) Seattle’s Central Waterfront. 

She has served on multiple nonprofit boards over her career, including the Atlantic Avenue Local Development Corporation, where she revamped and revitalized New York City’s largest street fair and led efforts to strengthen the street as a walkable neighborhood retail corridor. Other board affiliations have included the Urban Green Council and New Yorkers for Parks. She currently serves as a board member of the City Parks Alliance, the country’s only national advocacy organization for urban parks, and is a member of the Urban Land Institute’s Placemaking Council. 

Candace is an Amherst College and Harvard Law School graduate.  She works out of HR&A’s NYC office while living in Vermont with her husband, son, and dog.   

Randy Rowe
Chairman, Green Courte Partners
Chicago, IL, USA

Randy Rowe is Chairman of Green Courte Partners, LLC (“GCP”), a private equity real estate investment firm focused on niche real estate strategies. GCP currently has three active niche strategies: 1) near airport parking (“The Parking Spot”); 2) manufactured housing communities; and 3) active adult/independent living properties. Previously Mr. Rowe was a co-founder and Chairman of Transwestern Investment Company, LLC and Chairman and Director of Transwestern Commercial Services, LLC. Mr. Rowe was also Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Hometown America, LLC, a large owner of manufactured housing communities. Mr. Rowe is a Trustee and former Global Chairman of the Urban Land Institute, an Emeritus Trustee of the Steppenwolf Theatre, and a member and former Chairman of the Real Estate Roundtable. Mr. Rowe holds a BA from Denison University, an MBA from Harvard University and a JD from the University of Michigan.