CUOMO APPOINTS VICTOR RUBIN AS DIRECTOR OF HUD'S OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY PARTNERSHIPS

WASHINGTON - Housing and Urban Development Secretary Andrew Cuomo today announced that Dr. Victor Rubin of the University of California at Berkeley will serve for a year as Director of HUD's Office of University Partnerships.

"Victor Rubin will help the Office of University Partnerships build on its record of success," Cuomo said. "We're helping to make colleges and universities the gateway to the American Dream - not just for their students, but for their neighbors."

The Office of University Partnerships helps colleges and universities revitalize distressed low-income neighborhoods near their campuses and bring new opportunity to people living there. The colleges and universities provide job training and counseling, as well as economic development, crime prevention, and housing assistance to people in nearby neighborhoods.

Rubin, 47, is taking a leave of absence from the University of California at Berkeley to come to HUD. The long-time Oakland, California resident has been with the University-Oakland Metropolitan Forum since 1986, and has been its director of Research and Community Programs since 1991.

The Oakland Forum is a campus-community partnership that promotes economic development, education reform and innovations in technology with community groups and local government. Rubin is also an Adjunct Associate Professor at the University, in the Department of City and Regional Planning.

Rubin will begin his one-year appointment May 17. He is the fourth person HUD has tapped from the academic community to fill the Director's position through one-year assignments under the Intergovernmental Personnel Act program. Under this federal government-wide program, professionals from state and local colleges and universities go to work for the government for a year, with the federal agency reimbursing the person's home institution.