John D. Atlas
Revson Fellow 2003-2004
Founder and President; former Executive Director
National Housing Institute/Shelterforce; Passaic County Legal Aid Society
John Atlas is founder and President of the National Housing Institute/Shelterforce (NHI), a think tank dedicated to promoting empowerment and community building strategies that will help lead to affordable housing, urban revitalization, and an engaged civil society. NHI produces studies dealing with public housing, homelessness, employee-assisted housing, and crime prevention, and publishes Shelterforce, the oldest independent magazine dedicated to creating and preserving thriving communities. Mr. Atlas started Shelterforce magazine to serve as the voice of and to give strategic direction to the burgeoning tenants’ rights movement in the 1970s. For 21 years, Mr. Atlas also was the executive director of the nationally recognized Passaic County Legal Aid Society (PCLAS), which provided free legal services to the poor. Mr. Atlas serves on the boards of the New Jersey Tenant Organization (NJTO), New Jersey Public Policy Perspective, and Leadership New Jersey Alumni Association, and is a member of the Council on Civil Society and the Working Group on Human Needs and Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, which recently published a report on harnessing faith-based power to fight poverty. He was a founder of New Jersey Citizen Action and the Campaign For America’s Future and has served on several advisory boards and commissions, including the New Jersey State Planning Commission. In 1993, the Clinton Administration appointed Mr. Atlas to the Advisory Board of the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC). Mr. Atlas has appeared on numerous television and radio public affairs programs, and hosted a bi-weekly radio program on New York’s WBAI-FM. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, Dissent, The American Prospect, The New Jersey Reporter, The Nation, The Progressive, The Washington Post, Tikkun, Foundation News and The Star Ledger. Mr. Atlas has co-authored chapters with Peter Dreier for several books including: Beyond Reagan, Alternatives For the 80s, Critical Perspectives on Housing, Changing America, Blueprints for the New Administration, and American Cities. He co-authored the book Saving Affordable Housing, funded by the Ford Foundation. He also produced the award-winning documentary on the housing crisis, Not the American Dream. Mr. Atlas holds a law degree from Boston University and a master of laws from George Washington University National Law Center. He is married to Bonnie Friedman and has two children. One of his proudest moments was coaching his children’s soccer and little league teams. As a Revson Fellow, Mr. Atlas intends to focus on the intersection of journalism and urban policy and will begin work on a book that examines how organizing can mobilize people so as to have an impact on public policy and improve life for people who live in poor areas.
(The Revson Fellow’s biography that appears above was last updated in 2003. Revson Fellows may update their biographies on this site by sending email to: revson@columbia.edu)
The Revson year gave me the opportunity to immerse myself in education reform literature, engage in a year-long analysis of reform proposals, and through coursework, readings, and discussion with Teachers College faculty and students, develop my own ideas about how urban public schools might be improved. The program allowed me to make a critical transition in both where and how I’d previously worked.
