Kevin Lee Hepner Joins Nonprofit Management and Mission
Kevin Lee Hepner, who teaches nonprofit management at SMG and SSW, will become president of United South End Settlements.
In 1989, Frieda Garcia, then the president of the United South End Settlements, a Boston social service and community center, persuaded Kevin Lee Hepner to leave his corporate accounting job and try his hand at community organizing as her vice president of finance and administration. Hepner, an adjunct assistant professor who teaches nonprofit financial management at the School of Social Work and the School of Management, never looked back, rising to become the organization’s executive vice president before leaving in 2002 to serve as vice president at the Judge Baker Children’s Center, a Harvard-affiliated organization that promotes children’s mental health.
On January 22, Hepner returns to United South End Settlements as its new president, assuming the post once held by the person who lured him from an “unfulfilling” corporate career.
“What’s exciting about this position is that it gives me the opportunity to be the leader of a nonprofit that has itself been a leader for more than 100 years,” says Hepner. “This is a nonprofit that was the first in a lot of things.”
The United South End Settlements traces its roots back to the 1890s and Boston’s original settlement houses, which provided education, basic health care, food, and lodging to the city’s poor. Today the organization has a staff of 58 and a budget of about $3.6 million and offers services such as adult education, senior services, an art center, and technology education.
As he gets ready to lead these efforts, Hepner says one of his first objectives is to prepare for the organization’s annual fundraiser on February 28. He stresses that while money is essential for a nonprofit’s mission, it shouldn’t be mistaken for the mission itself. Too often, he says, today’s nonprofit managers feel pressure to follow the for-profit model.
“A lot of nonprofits are being praised for being so much better managed, for having a positive bottom line and growing assets,” says Hepner. “But the question should be, has their ability to meet their mission grown, and how do you measure that?”
Chris Berdik can be reached at cberdik@bu.edu.
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