Charles Marohn is the Founder and President of Strong Towns. He's a Professional Engineer (PE) licensed in the State of Minnesota and a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP). Marohn has a bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Minnesota's Institute of Technology and a Master of Urban and Regional Planning degree from the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute.

Marohn is the lead author of Thoughts on Building Strong Towns — Volume 1, Volume 2  and Volume 3 — as well as the author of A World Class Transportation System. He hosts the Strong Towns Podcast and is a primary writer for Strong Towns’ web content. He has presented Strong Towns concepts in hundreds of cities and towns across North America and in 2017 was named one of the 10 Most Influential Urbanists of all time by Planetizen.

Rachel Quednau serves as Communications Director for Strong Towns and has been a regular contributor and podcast host for Strong Towns since 2015. Previously, she worked for several organizations fighting to end homelessness at the federal and local levels. Rachel is a Midwesterner currently living in Milwaukee, WI with her husband, Jack, but draws from her experiences living in New York City, Washington, DC, Walla Walla, WA and Minneapolis, MN to help her build better places wherever she is. Rachel has a B.A. in Religion from Whitman College. One of her favorite ways to get to know a new city is by going for a run in it. You can find her musings on Twitter @rquednau.

Interested in writing for Strong Towns or contacting us with a press inquiry? Please email Rachel.

Kea Wilson serves as Director of Community Engagement for Strong Towns. She's based in the great city of St. Louis, Missouri, but she's lived everywhere from Santa Fe, New Mexico to coastal Maryland to far northern Michigan. She became passionate about the question of what it means to build a better world when she was in college, where she volunteered at a co-op bike collective and studied (most of) the great works of western civilization, roughly in chronological order. She's worked in community outreach and development for six years, most recently at a small independent bookstore where she coordinated a not-so-small author events series. She's also an avid (if somewhat slow) cyclist, an armchair economics nerd, and a novelist.

Have a question about joining the Strong Towns movement or how to get involved in our work? Please email Kea.

Max Azzarello serves as Growth Manager for Strong Towns. He has studied anthropology, public policy and urban planning. His work is as diverse as his residence, from energy management in New York to electoral politics in Sacramento to social justice in Los Angeles. You can currently find him riding his prized Yamaha scooter up and down the beach in the San Diego, California. His passions include chess, creative writing, and Medieval Scandinavian poetry. He considers Microsoft Paint to be the most underrated software of all time.    

Are you a Strong Towns member with a question about your membership status or payments? Please email Max.

Bo Wright serves as Development Director for Strong Towns. Previously, he was a research analyst at Calvin Edwards & Company, where he provided consulting services to support the giving decisions of major donors. Prior to that he was a research fellow at the Georgia Center for Opportunity, a state-based public policy think-tank dedicated to increasing opportunity and improving the quality of life for all Georgians. In 2013, Bo was a fellow at the John Jay Institute.

Are you interested in strategically supporting the Strong Towns mission? Get in touch with Bo.

Michelle Erfurt serves as Strong Towns' Pathfinder. Guided by a passion for helping people, Michelle navigates people through the process of bringing a Strong Towns event to their area. Her first career is in music therapy. She spent her clinical years working to decrease pain, improve coping, and enhance interpersonal relationships of hospice and hospitalized patients. Michelle became interested in the topic of city design, the influence of the built environment, and planners after marrying into the field. Her husband, Ed Erfurt, is Assistant City Manager in Ranson, WV and a long-time friend and member of Strong Towns.

Would you like to bring Strong Towns staff to your town for a speaking engagement? Please email Michelle.

Connor Nielsen is an intern with Strong Towns and the geoanalytics firm, Urban3, for the summer of 2018. He studies Economic Development and Dramatic Art at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is passionate about storytelling and urbanism, and he seeks to unite these fields by advocating for urban design in new and compelling ways. He also enjoys acting, producing theater, hiking, and traveling.

Charles Marohn is the Founder and President of Strong Towns. He's a Professional Engineer (PE) licensed in the State of Minnesota and a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP). Marohn has a bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Minnesota's Institute of Technology and a Master of Urban and Regional Planning degree from the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute.

Marohn is the lead author of Thoughts on Building Strong Towns — Volume 1, Volume 2  and Volume 3 — as well as the author of A World Class Transportation System. He hosts the Strong Towns Podcast and is a primary writer for Strong Towns’ web content. He has presented Strong Towns concepts in hundreds of cities and towns across North America and in 2017 was named one of the 10 Most Influential Urbanists of all time by Planetizen.

Rachel Quednau serves as Communications Director for Strong Towns and has been a regular contributor and podcast host for Strong Towns since 2015. Previously, she worked for several organizations fighting to end homelessness at the federal and local levels. Rachel is a Midwesterner currently living in Milwaukee, WI with her husband, Jack, but draws from her experiences living in New York City, Washington, DC, Walla Walla, WA and Minneapolis, MN to help her build better places wherever she is. Rachel has a B.A. in Religion from Whitman College. One of her favorite ways to get to know a new city is by going for a run in it. You can find her musings on Twitter @rquednau.

Interested in writing for Strong Towns or contacting us with a press inquiry? Please email Rachel.

Kea Wilson serves as Director of Community Engagement for Strong Towns. She's based in the great city of St. Louis, Missouri, but she's lived everywhere from Santa Fe, New Mexico to coastal Maryland to far northern Michigan. She became passionate about the question of what it means to build a better world when she was in college, where she volunteered at a co-op bike collective and studied (most of) the great works of western civilization, roughly in chronological order. She's worked in community outreach and development for six years, most recently at a small independent bookstore where she coordinated a not-so-small author events series. She's also an avid (if somewhat slow) cyclist, an armchair economics nerd, and a novelist.

Have a question about joining the Strong Towns movement or how to get involved in our work? Please email Kea.

Daniel Herriges has been a regular contributor to Strong Towns since 2015 and is a founding member of the organization. Daniel has a Masters in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Minnesota. His obsession with maps began before he could read. His budding environmentalism can be traced back to age 4, when he yelled at his parents for stepping on weeds growing in sidewalk cracks. His love of great urban design and human-scaled, livable places has also been lifelong. Daniel has a B.A. from Stanford University in Human Biology with a concentration in Conservation and Sustainable Development. After college, he worked as an environmental activist for several years, in support of indigenous people's rights and conservation in the Amazon rainforest. He can often be found hiking or cycling. Daniel is from St. Paul, Minnesota.

Sarah Kobos has been a regular contributor for Strong Towns since 2016. She is an urban design nerd and community activist from Tulsa, OK. Her superpower is the ability to transform almost any topic into a conversation about zoning. Whenever possible, she explores other cities and writes about urban design and land use issues at AccidentalUrbanist.com.

Nolan Gray has been a regular contributor for Strong Towns since 2016. He is an urban planning researcher and a contributor to Market Urbanism. He lives in New York City.

Alexander Dukes has been a regular contributor for Strong Towns since 2016, and works as a Community Planner for the US Air Force at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey. He is a graduate of Tuskegee University and Auburn University, with a Bachelor’s in Political Science and a Master’s in Community Planning, respectively. With this background, Alexander focuses his planning work on both public policy and the design of the physical realm for both military and civilian applications. Alexander is principally concerned with building sustainable urban environments and neighborhoods that provide all citizens with access to meaningful employment, civic resources, and beautiful places.

Spencer Gardner has been writing for Strong Towns since 2016. He is a transportation planner based in Madison, WI, who spends his spare time chasing his children, riding bikes, doing hobbyist computer programming, and very occasionally writing about urban issues. You can read his thoughts about transportation at http://roadsarelike.tumblr.com.

Sara Joy Proppe has been a regular contributor for Strong Towns since 2016. She works by day as a Project Manager in real estate development in the Twin Cities where she oversees a variety of mixed-use and multifamily historic and urban infill projects. In her free time, she is developing Proximity Project to educate and activate churches to be stewards of the built environment. She loves to write and speak on the connections between theology and our design and use of physical space.

Wondering why your local government is claiming it needs to widen a street to make it "safer"? Trying to make sense of the outdated zoning codes in your city? R. Moses has the answer. From the Strong Towns membership, we've assembled a panel of licensed engineers to answer your questions under the collective pseudonym R. Moses. In doing this, we hope to give licensed professionals a chance to speak to important issues without fear of reprisal from their peers or employers. Submit your engineering question anonymously and R. Moses will do his best to answer it in a future post.

Max Azzarello serves as Growth Manager for Strong Towns. He has studied anthropology, public policy and urban planning. His work is as diverse as his residence, from energy management in New York to electoral politics in Sacramento to social justice in Los Angeles. You can currently find him riding his prized Yamaha scooter up and down the beach in the San Diego, California. His passions include chess, creative writing, and Medieval Scandinavian poetry. He considers Microsoft Paint to be the most underrated software of all time.    

Are you a Strong Towns member with a question about your membership status or payments? Please email Max.

Connor Nielsen is an intern with Strong Towns and the geoanalytics firm, Urban3, for the summer of 2018. He studies Economic Development and Dramatic Art at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is passionate about storytelling and urbanism, and he seeks to unite these fields by advocating for urban design in new and compelling ways. He also enjoys acting, producing theater, hiking, and traveling.

Alissa Danckaert-Skovira teaches writing at Kent State University. She has a background in English and history, and she enjoys anything and everything to do with research and writing. Her interests include historic preservation, politics, gardening, and all things Akron. 

Jen Jones Donatelli is a Cleveland-based author and journalist. Currently, she is the editor of FreshWater Cleveland, an online publication that covers the people, places, and projects shaping and transforming Cleveland. She is also a contributing editor for Destination Cleveland’s city guides and has written for other regional publications including Cleveland Magazine and Ohio Today. On a national level, her work has appeared in GOOD, Redbook, Budget Travel, Robb Report, Los Angeles Confidential, and more.

Laura Dorwart has written for The New York Times, SheKnows, Bustle, Bitch, VICE, Catapult, McSweeney's, and HuffPost, among other outlets. She has an MFA in creative nonfiction from Antioch University and was a Fletcher B. Jones Dissertation Fellow at UC San Diego. She lives in Ohio.

Kailey Sherrick lives in Wooster, Ohio and works as a Social Media Manager. She's a recent graduate of the Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts (NEOMFA) program, where she earned her MFA in Creative Nonfiction. Besides writing, Kailey enjoys playing softball, gardening, spending time with her family, and being involved in her community.