Everyone in RUSS is grateful for the sustained support the organisation has received from professionals in the field who have offered not just their expertise but also energy and encouragement. Among the many volunteers over the years, we particularly want to note the continuing contribution made by our ‘Associates’.
Olly Bishop-Young – Volunteer Hub Manager (2022 – Present)
Olly is a director of Green Roof Shelters Ltd, designing and producing ‘a building and wildlife habitat in one’. He has helped develop a range of living roofed shelters for bicycles, bins etc. which bring biodiversity to the built environment. He also produces one-off furniture commissions from a Cooperative workshop in Kentish Town. As a future resident of Church Grove Olly has been involved with RUSS for some time. He has taken a more active role as Volunteer Hub Manager since 2022 and looks forward to being hands on during the construction phase of the communal spaces.
Jon Broome
Jon is an architect and self-builder with particular experience and expertise in affordable housing, self-build, community projects and sustainable, low-energy construction. He has been involved in RUSS since its inception, initially as a volunteer then as Jon Broome Architects, employed as consultants on Strategic Project Design. More recently, he has been a volunteer member of the Project Board and currently is a volunteer Design Advisor.
Mike Freed – Chair of Church Grove Project Board (2017–2021)
Mike is experienced in delivering infrastructure, building services and sustainability within the built environment, across the commercial building, technology and housing association sectors. He was also part of the core RUSS volunteer-led team that designed and built our high quality Community Hub on the RUSS site, unveiled as part of Open House 2019.
He is passionate about affordable housing in London and the opportunity that provides for residents and those around them. He believes RUSS is a fantastic collaboration of a diverse group of energetic people, set to create a positive legacy that we trust future residents will be proud to call home.
Dinah Roake
Dinah has wide experience of community-led housing projects and includes working at a senior level in the private, public, housing association and third sectors. Her previous roles include leading a 300-home community-led housing scheme in Brixton, working for Peabody Trust on a major estate regeneration project in Hackney, and helping to draft the business plan for the GLA for the London Community-Led Housing Hub. Further experience includes Government’s Homes and Communities Agency (now called Homes England) and English Partnerships, is currently a non-Executive Director of Otterpool Park LLP a new 10,000 home Garden City and the Chair of the London Housing Panel. She’s also an expert member of the British Standard Institute’s ‘sustainable development in communities’ committee.
Her role at RUSS over 4 years covered financial oversight for the organisation and doing everything necessary, working through the COVID pandemic with key stakeholders, such as Lewisham Council, the GLA, local Church Grove residents and the many organisations that have provided grants, loans or other support to RUSS, to make sure the Church Grove project got to start on site, and is well underway.
