Meet SCANPH Board Member Rachel Rosner
Rachel Rosner, Senior Counsel, Bocarsly Emden Cowan Esmail & Arndt LLP
SCANPH Board Members – the strength behind its success – are geographically diverse and serve as experts, practitioners, and advocates for supporting policy and programming that addresses the needs of economically disadvantaged individuals and families who are most in need of affordable housing. Our team is grateful to be backed by the decades of experience and expertise of the board, who reflect a diverse and representative body of SCANPH organizational members.
SCANPH will introduce each of our board members and share background about the leadership we count on to guide our initiatives.
Rachel Rosner serves as SCANPH's Board Secretary. She is senior counsel at Bocarsly Emden Cowan Esmail & Arndt LLP, where she represents developers, equity investors, and tax credit syndicators in connection with the financing and development of affordable housing and economic development projects across the United States. She has extensive experience working on developments financed with Federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits, Tax Exempt Private Activity Bonds, Federal CDBG and HOME Funds, local tax increment funds and other similar sources. She has been recognized for helping to establish an affordable housing law clinic at UCLA Law School and is the coauthor of The Low Income Housing Tax Credit: A Valuable Tool for Financing the Development of Affordable Housing, published in the 2016 Fall Papers of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers. Rachel earned her Juris Doctor from Washington University in St. Louis, where she received the Equal Justice Works Award for her commitment to public service and served as Senior Editor of the Washington University Law Review. She earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from the honors program at the University of Maryland. Rachel lives in Encino with her husband, Jesse Gabriel, and their sons, Ethan and Joshua.
Why were you interested in joining the board of SCANPH?
As an attorney, I typically work on affordable housing issues on a deal-by-deal basis. I was excited about the opportunity to aid in SCANPH’s important work and to help contribute to the industry on a more systemic level. I also really appreciate the feeling of community that SCANPH creates, and I was eager to help further foster relationships among local affordable housing advocates.
What is the best part of your job (either for you organization or as a board member or both)?
The opportunity to work with great people is clearly the best part of my job at the firm and my role is a SCANPH board member. At my office, I have the pleasure of working with an incredibly talented, engaged and caring group of people. As a member of the SCANPH board, I have loved the chance to get to know a diverse group of leaders who are shaping affordable housing policies at all levels of government and effectively advocating for change.
How did you first get involved in the affordable housing sector?
I had always wanted to use my legal training to help alleviate poverty through housing, and I feel so fortunate to those - Dora Gallo, Anne Friedrich, Ray Pearl and others - who steered me in the direction of Bocarsly Emden when I was a fresh law school graduate and recent Los Angeles transplant.
What might people be surprised to know about you?
After graduating college, I spent several months writing my grandfather’s memoir. I chronicled the story of his family’s immigration to this country, the establishment and operation of his small business and the trials and tribulations of raising a Jewish family in a small town in rural Ohio.
If you didn’t live in Southern California where would you live?
Right now, if I were not living in Southern California, I’d choose to be in Sacramento because my husband Jesse was recently elected to represent the West San Fernando Valley in the State Assembly.
If you could trade places with any other person for a week, famous or not, living or dead, real or fictional, with whom would it be? And Why?
Assuming I could bring along her courage, intellect and generally awesome persona, I would love to spend a week as Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I think it would be fascinating to have an in-depth look at one of the most inspiring female leaders of our time.