Erich Bilal

My first paying job was in high school: working in a garage workshop in Chapel Hill, NC, helping a family friend (and aspiring artist) assemble his politically-tinged take on German-style cuckoo clocks. The pay wasn’t great, but I did get a free biscuit from Sunrise Biscuit Kitchen every morning, so I’d say it was all worth it!

I studied landscape architecture and urban design in undergrad at the University of Georgia, then went on to study city planning in grad school at the University of Pennsylvania, focusing on real estate development and economic development. I worked in private-sector real estate and then for a nonprofit real estate development firm, focused on community facilities. Both of those roles worked well to prepare me for the transformative type of work we do here at NYCEDC.