The Real Estate Center at DePaul University has expanded its staff by three to enhance its student career services and manage two center initiatives associated with The Preservation Compact, a multi-faceted project launched by a coalition of organizations to preserve affordable rental housing in Chicago.

Real estate executive Stephen G. Bell, of Lake Forest, a licensed member of the American Institute of Architects, joins the center as associate director. In this new post, Bell, 62, will be a liaison between the real estate community and students to coordinate mentoring, internship and career placement efforts for undergraduate and graduate students studying in DePaul’s real estate degree programs. He also joins DePaul’s Department of Finance as a full-time faculty member after nine years as an adjunct professor. He will teach real estate analysis and a newly developed course in planning and public policy that incorporates the Urban Land Institute’s (ULI) Urban Plan, a simulation project where teams of real estate students present their proposals for redeveloping a blighted area of a hypothetical downtown before a mock city council made up of local ULI members.

Bell comes to DePaul from CB Richard Ellis, where he worked for 14 years as a senior real estate executive overseeing a large team of real estate professionals in the areas of property management, leasing, construction and engineering. He previously worked at Brookfield Development Inc. as vice president for development. There he was responsible for developing high-rise, mixed-use, office, retail and condo projects, including Chicago Place on Michigan Avenue and 321 N. Clark Street, a million-square-foot Class A office building. Bell earned MBA and master’s of engineering degrees from Cornell University and also holds a master’s degree in architecture from the University of Kansas.

The Real Estate Center also has hired Marc Smith, 55, of Oak Park as director of the Data Clearinghouse Project and Stacie Young, 38, of Rogers Park, as director of the Interagency Coordinating Council. The two positions were created to support The Preservation Compact, a comprehensive project launched in May by ULI, with support from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, to halt the dramatic decrease of affordable rental housing in Cook County by preserving 75,000 existing housing units by 2020.

With a $3.5 million grant from MacArthur, the Real Estate Center has been charged with managing two of the Preservation Compact’s six initiatives. Smith oversees the project’s Rental Housing Data Clearinghouse, which will track the status of subsidized and unsubsidized affordable rental housing in the region using data from city, county and state agencies and other sources. Young manages the new Interagency Council, which coordinates government bodies around resources, programs and policies related to affordable rental housing.

Smith comes to DePaul from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he was an associate professor and extension housing specialist at the School of Human Ecology. He previously co-directed the Shimberg Center for Affordable Housing and was an associate professor at the School of Building Construction, University of Florida. Smith earned his doctoral degree in business, concentrating in real estate, from Ohio State University. He also holds a master of city planning degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a bachelor’s degree in economics and urban studies from Denison University, Granville, Ohio.

Prior to her work at DePaul, Young worked in the City of Chicago Mayor’s Office as assistant to the mayor on affordability. In this role she coordinated affordable housing and community development efforts for the city, dealing with issues that ranged from city-owned land and building code challenges, to programs for human services and special needs populations, to creating artist housing and cultivating the creative arts in Chicago. Before joining the mayor’s office, she was the director of policy and research for the Chicago Department of Housing. Young earned a master’s degree in public policy from the University of Chicago and a bachelor’s degree in communication from Northwestern University.

“Steve, Marc and Stacie bring extensive real estate industry, research and public policy experience to the center,” said Susanne Cannon, the Douglas and Cynthia Crocker Endowed Director of the Real Estate Center “They will strengthen our career links between students and the real estate community and will help us fulfill our commitment to help save the region’s affordable rental housing.”

Based in DePaul’s Kellstadt Graduate School of Business, the Real Estate Center at DePaul is the premier Midwest center for real estate education, research and career enrichment. The center guides DePaul’s undergraduate and graduate degree programs in real estate through the Department of Finance as well as continuing education programs and conferences on relevant topics of interest to the real estate industry.