Farm&City is a small, startup nonprofit growing to fill unmet needs at the state and regional level and to support the work of many people across the state. We do our work by empowering people to help improve public policies, including building a team of professional nonprofit advocacy staff. To do this work, we need a growing team helping to keep this organization going and supporting our capacity.
Board of Directors
Megan Howse Brendle
Jacob Clifton
Ben DiPietro
Toto Miranda
Staff
Jay Blazek Crossley
Executive Director
jay@farmandcity.org
Jay Blazek Crossley was born in Whitney, grew up in Montrose, came to Austin for ten years to get two degrees from the University of Texas, moved back to Houston for ten years to work for Houston Tomorrow, and moved back to Austin in 2016 with his wife and young son to change the paradigm of transportation and urban planning in Texas. He holds a Masters in Public Affairs from the LBJ School at UT-Austin and the LINE Certificate from the Leadership Institute for Nonprofit Executives at Rice University.
Crossley serves on the Austin Pedestrian Advisory Council, the Capital Metro Project Connect Advisory Network, the Texas Strategic Highway Safety Plan Stakeholder Committee and several emphasis area teams, and as a member of the Board of Directors of Vision Zero ATX.
David Fouts
Safe Streets Training Leader
david@farmandcity.org
David grew up in California but lived in China for seven years before moving to Austin, Texas. He holds a bachelor’s in Chinese Language and Literature from Portland State University, a bachelor’s in Urban Planning from Arizona State University, and a master’s in International Relations from Zhejiang University. He is an advocate for a safer and more comprehensive transportation system and abundant housing in Austin where he works with local groups, like AURA, to accomplish this. He also serves on Austin’s Zoning and Platting Commission. David’s primary responsibility at Farm&City is developing, planning, and instructing the Safe Streets for Texans training workshops for local governments across Texas.
Hailey McHorse
Vision Zero GIS Intern
hailey@farmandcity.org
Hailey was born and raised in Austin, Texas, and she is a rising senior at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, where she is pursuing degrees in both Mathematics and History. Her childhood love of geography blossomed into a passion for urbanism, and she is passionate about using data to inform good urban and transportation planning. Last fall, she spent a semester intensively studying urban development in Berlin, Germany, where she fell in love with the vibrant, inviting streetscapes as a pedestrian exploring the city. McHorse is one of two Vision Zero Interns with Farm&City, assisting with the Safe Streets for Texans and Pedestrian Safety Training for Law Enforcement projects by conducting outreach, assisting with trainings, and creating high-injury network maps for cities in Texas.
Katrina Miller
Policy Analyst
katrina@FarmAndCity.org
Katrina was born and raised in a tiny walkable village in Alaska, and attended Willamette University in Oregon, where she received a Bachelor of Arts in Public Health with a focus on active mobility and climate resilience. In 2022, she followed family to Texas and has been involved in local mobility, housing, and sustainability advocacy in Austin ever since. Miller serves on the Austin Pedestrian Advisory Council and works on Vision Zero Texas projects including Farm&City’s pilot Pedestrian Safety for Law Enforcement Trainings as well as Safe Streets for Texans trainings.
Pete Rios
Vision Zero Training Intern
peter@farmandcity.org
Pete was born in Northeast Texas and he spent time in both Florida and Texas while growing up. He is a current graduate student at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. Pete attended Texas A&M University-Commerce where he received a Bachelor of Science in Psychology. Pete is one of two Summer 2024 Vision Zero Interns, where he will help advance Safe Streets for Texans and Pedestrian Safety Training for Law Enforcement across the state.
Scott White
Director, Vision Zero Texas
scott@farmandcity.org
Scott White was born in Austin, and grew up in El Paso where he earned both his Bachelors and Masters degrees from the University of Texas at El Paso. Scott is a League of American Bicyclists certified instructor, and has been accredited by the Congress of New Urbanism. Scott is based in El Paso, where he continues to serve on the Velo Paso Bicycle-Pedestrian Coalition board, and as a member of the local Safe Routes to School and Complete Streets coalitions. He is also a member of the El Paso Vision Zero workgroup, helping to create the City’s, Vision Zero safety action plan. His primary focus here with Farm&City is leading our Vision Zero Texas program, including our statewide advocacy, outreach and education initiatives, as well as building our programing capacity.
Future Job Openings
We do not have any open positions at this time. However, if you share our vision and passion for this work, please feel free to contact Jay Blazek Crossley for more information or to share your resume and career goals. He’s always happy to go out for lunch or coffee and talk about improving Texas public policy.
Consultants
Ruven Brooks
Senior GIS Mapping and Research Fellow
Ruven@FarmAndCity.org
Ruven Brooks is retired from more than forty years of industrial and university work in software development and research on software development. His current focus is on applying the skills he has acquired in data analysis and modeling to shaping public policy, particularly in the area of transit.
In addition to providing data analyses and models to support social change, he is also interested in using quality methods developed in the software industry to improve the ways in which governmental agencies perform their own data analysis and modeling, with the goal of making what are sometimes complex technical processes more accessible to the wider public.
He has a Ph.D. degree from Tepper School of Business at Carnegie-Mellon University.
Former Staff
Cam Brett, Research Assistant
Ken Flippin, Lead Organizer, Vision Zero Texas
Ashkan Jahangiri, Policy Analyst & Daily Headlines, Streetsblog Texas
Daniel Kavelman, Land Use Reform Lead
Alexandria Chloe Mayer, GIS Analyst
Liz McGehee, AURA YIMBYtown Lead
Jesse Woche, Organizer, Vision Zero Texas
Alyson Vargas, Policy Analyst
Former Interns
Caroline “Cara” Cook, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs
Tynan J. Holt, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs
Nafisa Iskandar, UT-Austin, Community & Regional Planning
Madilyn Jarman, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs
Olivia Muehlberger, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs
Kaia Robinson, UT-Austin, UT-Austin, Sustainability Studies/Smart Cities
August Stanley, UT-Austin, Community & Regional Planning
Nile Stewart, UT-Austin, College of Liberal Arts
Heather Yu, UW-Seattle, Evans School of Public Administration
Philip Jankoski, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs
Laura Thomas, UT-Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs