Alexander Polikoff
Director, Public Housing Program

Alexander Polikoff has served as lead counsel in the Gautreaux public housing litigation for more than 40 years. Alex joined BPI one year after its founding in 1970 as Executive Director, a position he held for almost 30 years. Prior to holding that position, he was a member of Chicago law firm Schiff Hardin & Waite. He received his BA, MA (the latter in English Language and Literature) and JD from the University of Chicago. He is the author of Housing the Poor: The Case for Heroism (1978) and Waiting for Gautreaux (2006).
apolikoff@bpichicago.org

Julie Elena Brown
Senior Staff Counsel

Julie Elena Brown has served as Staff Counsel since 1989 and currently works on housing litigation and policy development. Prior to her role at BPI, Julie served as Assistant Corporation Counsel with the City of Chicago Law Department. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin and JD from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where she was on staff at the Law Review and an editor at the International Law Journal.
jbrown@bpichicago.org

Kate Pomper

Staff Counsel

Kate joined BPI as the tenth Polikoff-Gautreaux Fellow in September 2008, having received dual degrees from the University of Michigan's Law School and the Ford School of Public Policy. While in law school she was Article Editor for the Journal of Law Reform, a Dean’s Public Service Fellow, and co-chaired Michigan's ACLU chapter. She served as a member of the Board of the Ford School’s Women and Gender in Public Policy.  Kate graduated from the University of Virginia in 2001, Phi Beta Kappa, with a B.A. in Economics with High Distinction, where she was also a Jefferson Scholar. In her graduate school summers, Kate interned in Chicago with the Mayor’s Office, the Shriver Center on Poverty Law, and the Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago. She also spent three years working in Washington, D.C. for the Urban Institute’s Income and Policy Benefits Center and the National Women’s Law Center.  At BPI, Kate works with BPI’s Public Housing team.

Kate is the 2008 Polikoff-Gautreaux Fellow.

 kpomper@bpichicago.org