Our Staff

Arif Ullah

Executive Director

Arif is a social and environmental justice advocate, grassroots urban planner, and community activist with more than 20 years of experience in designing and managing community development programs, establishing diverse alliances, and co-creating campaign strategies around local, state, and national issues. 

Prior to joining South Bronx Unite, Arif was Director of Programs at an organization that supported hundreds of grassroots groups every year in their self-determined efforts to improve the quality of life in under-resourced neighborhoods across NYC. Before that, he worked as an immigrants’ rights advocate with American Friends Service Committee. He currently serves on the Mayor’s Sustainability Advisory Board, Anthropocene Alliance’s Board of Directors, Weill Cornell’s Cool Trees Advisory Board, and the NY-NJ Harbor and Estuary Program Management Committee. He is a co-founder of Bangladeshi Americans for Political Progress and a core member of Malcolm X Community Garden. Arif graduated from Hunter College and has a Master’s in Public Policy from Duke University. In his free time, he grows food and keeps honeybees at his community garden.

Arif believes in the power of frontline communities and he is committed to building systems that support their health, creativity, wisdom, and leadership.

Matthew Shore

Senior Organizer

Matthew is an embedded planner, organizer and policy enthusiast inspired by grassroots movements focused on community stewardship, health and racial justice. A Bronxite originally from Bedford Park, he’s active in Bronx-based efforts that aim to upend extractive planning and development in exchange for long-term community-led solutions that build our right to self determination boroughwide, including the Northwest Bronx Community & Clergy Coalition’s campaign for shared ownership of the Kingsbridge Armory and the Bronx-Wide Plan.

Prior to joining South Bronx Unite, he supported anti-displacement organizing for small businesses and learned from the City’s oldest CLT as an ANHD Graduate Fellow for Cooper Square Committee. He also helped kickstart efforts to build an open space equity coalition between several nonprofits in Brooklyn CB1. He also provided research and administrative support for the passage of the CLCPA while working as an Environmental and Urban Policy Analyst for the NYS Assembly.

Matthew obtained a B.A. in Public Policy from SUNY Albany and an M.S. Urban Planning degree from Columbia University, where he critically engaged with the City’s work regarding climate justice, flooding resilience, rezoning, affordable housing, and street vending in frontline communities in the Bronx and Harlem. When free, he enjoys parks, soccer, international movies and chats with his cats!

Devan Cronshaw

Director of Special Projects

Devan is an urban planner advocating for capital projects and policy initiatives that are led by the community, for the community. He has over 7 years of experience in managing affordable housing and community facility real estate development. Originally from Treaty 1 territory in what is now called Canada, Devan has lived in East Harlem for three years. He is also an active Board Member of Community Board 11 serving East Harlem.

Prior to joining South Bronx Unite, Devan supported the development of several community capital projects in NYC as a Senior Project Manager with Hester Street. He also developed policy change initiatives forwarding the build-out of a community control ecosystem. Earlier in his career, he worked to develop over $100 million in affordable housing in Canada with an Indigenous-rooted nonprofit housing development firm.

Devan earned a Master of Community Planning degree from Vancouver Island University, where he researched the process and outcomes of waterfront development. This included the completion of an international research scholarship in Belize.