UPDATE: On June 3, the King County Regional Homelessness Authority’s Governing Board named Kelly Kinnison its permanent CEO.

As a King County Regional Homelessness Authority Implementation Board member, I am pleased that last night, we recommended hiring Kelly Kinnison, a division director of the US Department of Health and Human Services, as the authority’s new permanent CEO. The Implementation Board voted 7-2 (with three abstentions) in favor of Kinnison, and we will send that recommendation to the KCRHA Governing Board, which will make the final hiring decision.

This is an important and needed step in bringing long-term leadership to the KCRHA.

Kinnison is the director of the HHS Division of Family and Community Policy, where she oversees the development of housing and homelessness, incarceration and reentry, and local community strategies to address poverty.

Before HHS, Kinnison served as branch chief of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service, where she conducted research and analyzed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. She holds a Ph.D. in community psychology from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The Authority is currently led by interim CEO Darrell Powell, a former chief operations officer of United Way of King County, who is the Authority’s second interim leader since former CEO Marc Dones stepped down last year.

We are optimistic that the Governing Board will agree that this is the leader we need. We look forward to getting Dr. Kinnison on board as the CEO and continuing the important work of the Regional Homelessness Authority.