Initiative on Land, Housing and Property Rights

Founder & Director

Thomas W. Mitchell holds the Robert F. Drinan, S.J. Endowed Chair at BC Law and serves as the Director of the Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights, which seeks to help disadvantaged people and communities acquire and secure important property rights. Prior to joining Boston College in 2022, he served as a tenured professor on the faculties of the University of Wisconsin Law School (2000-2016) and Texas A&M University School of Law (2016-2022). In 2017-2018, he served as interim Dean of Texas A&M School of Law. 

Professor Mitchell is a national expert on property issues facing disadvantaged families and communities, and has published leading scholarly works addressing these matters in academic journals, government publications, and publications for trade associations such as the American Bar Association. He has been interviewed by numerous media outlets including the New Yorker, The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, NPR, ProPublica, The Nation, Politico, Mother Jones, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, VICE, and many more. 

Faculty Director, Housing and Property Rights Programs

Lisa Alexander's scholarship focuses on U.S. housing law and policy, and the law’s role in making housing markets more efficient and more equitable. She has conducted extensive research in legal and extra-legal rights to property, housing, and urban space, most recently including the study of tiny houses. Her scholarship and teaching illuminate the challenges of equitably allocating housing rights and opportunities, and provide insights to policymakers on how to reimagine housing options and property rights for today’s world. She teaches corporations, housing law and policy, and local government law at Boston College Law School.

Alexander received her B.A. from Wesleyan University and her J.D. from Columbia University. She was a professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School from 2006 to 2017 before moving to Texas A&M University School of Law. At Texas A&M, she held a joint appointment as a professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning. She was also Co-Founder and Co-Director of Texas A&M’s Program in Real Estate and Community Development Law, programming that she will continue at Boston College Law School. 

Associate Director

David Price is the Associate Director for the Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights at Boston College Law School. In this role he manages four program components which collectively advance community development, estate planning and property rights defense on behalf of disadvantaged communities:

• Training law students 
• Advocating for community-informed legislation and policies 
• Supporting research into critical property issues
• Sponsoring continuing legal education for attorneys and community practitioners  

Prior to joining BC Law, David worked for 27 years helping build strong local development organizations in Boston, including most recently over thirteen years as the Executive Director of Nuestra Comunidad Development Corporation in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood, where he departed in 2022. Two transformative developments are Bartlett Station in Roxbury’s Nubian Square and The Loop at Mattapan Station. At Nuestra he co-founded Homes for Equity, a research and advocacy coalition dedicated to the adoption of race-conscious homeownership policies to counter redlining and other forms of institutional racism. 

Prior to joining Nuestra, David served as Deputy Director and General Counsel for Madison Park Development Corporation and as Executive Director for Tent City Corporation. David’s community organizing experience began as a volunteer with Mel King’s campaigns for Mayor of Boston in 1979 and 1983.

David is a graduate of Harvard College (1977) and Boston College Law School (1991).  He clerked for Hon. Francis O’Connor at the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court and was a real estate attorney at Goulston & Storrs in Boston prior to joining the community development field.

Administrative Assistant

Samantha Ghelli serves as the Administrative Assistant for the Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights. She is an alumna of Louisiana State University (2022), where she studied International Law & Politics alongside Arabic and Middle Eastern Studies. 

Prior to her work with Boston College Law School, Samantha worked in industrial agriculture production. Please send all inquiries to the email or phone number listed to the left.