Lafayette Crump, Milwaukee Commissioner of City Development

When Lafayette Crump was sworn in as Milwaukee’s commissioner of city development in 2020, the city faced a series of stubborn challenges

When Lafayette Crump was sworn in as Milwaukee’s commissioner of city development in 2020, the city faced a series of stubborn challenges: a widening gap in housing quality between white and minority residents, a Downtown still grappling with vacant commercial buildings and districts of underused industrial land. Not long after, along came Covid.

Five years later, Commissioner Crump, 52, is still at the helm, steering projects that include redeveloping long-empty properties into affordable housing and coordinating with Public Works on the streets, sidewalks and public spaces that knit neighborhoods together. His work demands fluency in both economics and equity, skills he honed not in politics, but in law and the private sector...

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Leo’s notes: As Commissioner Lafayette Crump’s tenure illustrates, housing is no longer just a market outcome — it’s core civic infrastructure. From adaptive reuse downtown to workforce and supportive housing along key corridors, the city is using every available tool to close long-standing gaps, stabilize neighborhoods, and expand opportunity. In a city still thousands of affordable units short, these projects reinforce a central truth for Wisconsin communities: if we want economic growth, talent retention, and equitable outcomes, housing policy must lead, not follow.

Ken Notes: Great interview! We need to replicate some of this statewide.