Steven Hicks has served as the primary legal counsel for NID Housing’s day-to-day organizational needs for over a decade. As the organization has expanded, Steven has assumed the roles of VP of Development and Technology. While most of his work is embedded in NID Housing’s infrastructure, and not readily visible, Steven is pleased to have been the project lead and primary contributor to the redevelopment of NID’s website.

As Assistant General Counsel, Steven is responsible for managing the day-to-day legal affairs of NID Housing. This includes contract negotiation and formation, grant compliance, regulatory oversight and monitoring of the extensive NID Housing certified branch office network, drafting policy and procedure manuals, and handling anything else that that might have legal ramifications. He also regularly travels to Washington, D.C., for policy conferences and roundtables.

As VP Development, Steven meets with government, GSE, and private industry partners to discuss creative ways to collaborate for the benefit of the organizations and its clients. His ability to see the legal requirements of partnerships in addition to the commercial goals of NID’s partners allows for a quicker process flow than if these roles were handled by separate staff members. Ultimately, testing project initiatives is the best barometer of their usefulness, and Steven is able to assist in quickly taking multi-party ideas from the conference table to the counseling sessions.

As VP Technology, Steven has led NID Housing’s recent National Office network infrastructure rebuild. With the new hardware and network design, NID has the capability to engage its partners and certified branch office network in media-rich ways, such a video conference calling, live webinars with video, and rich social media content, all without slowing down the day-to-day office needs. Most recently, Steven was the project lead on the six-month redevelopment of NID Housing’s redesigned website.

Born and raised on the southwest side of Chicago, Steven attended the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign, earning a B.A. in English in 1999. After a few years of traveling and living abroad to better understand the growing anti-globalization movement, Steven enrolled at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law. While at Berkeley Law, Steven worked extensively in local jails and prisons on inmate rights issues. He was a member of the Berkeley Law Death Penalty Clinic for over a year, and authored portions of the habeas corpus petition relating to victim impact evidence. Steven graduated with his J.D. from the U.C. Berkeley School of Law in 2006.

In his moments without official titles, Steven enjoys running, talking with friends in coffee shops, walking among the incredible California landscape, and finding new ways to bring more silence into a deafeningly loud world.