Leslie Wise

About Leslie Wise

Most recently, Leslie served as a Strategy Consultant at Community Solutions, where she worked with domestic and international communities to design, strengthen, and govern systems intended to measurably reduce and end homelessness. Her expertise centered on advising and co-designing governance and leadership structures that drove population-level outcomes. She also consulted with a major healthcare provider to address homelessness among patient and broader community populations, integrating housing stability into health system strategies.During her tenure as a senior leader at Community Solutions, she led the strategy design and content development of Built for Zero, a national campaign that partnered with more than 120 U.S. and international communities to measurably reduce and end homelessness. This work was recognized by the MacArthur Foundation as demonstrating real and measurable progress on one of the most pressing social challenges of our time and resulted in a $100 million investment to deepen impact across participating communities.Leslie is a systems thinker and builder with deep experience in community-led change. In partnership with the United Way of Greater Los Angeles, she helped design a collaborative process that produced one of the earliest iterations of a Coordinated Entry System in Los Angeles, work that later informed similar efforts in several large cities nationwide. Earlier in her career at Community Solutions, she served as the lead field organizer for the Homes Campaign, focusing on community engagement in Los Angeles County. The campaign ultimately housed more than people nationwide and was recognized by the Obama Administration in 2014.Prior to joining Community Solutions, she served as Director of Policy and Planning at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA), where she oversaw one of the nation’s largest Point-in-Time counts and led applications to HUD for Homeless Assistance Program funding. She also served as Homelessness Policy Advisor to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, working in partnership with Los Angeles County to develop the region’s first-ever joint City–County homelessness policy platform.

Experience

1. Chief of Strategic Initiatives

   Field Impact Partners

   Jan 2026 — Present

Education

• University of Southern California

  Ross Minority Program in Real Estate

• Institute for Healthcare Improvement

  Improvement Coach Professional Development Program

• Ohio University

  Bachelor's degree, Social Work

  1994 — 1998

• Chicago Rehab Network

  Community Development and Empowerment Series