Robert Stuart to retire amid Orlando nonprofits’ changing of the guard
Longtime Orlando City Commissioner Robert Stuart is about to retire from his other day job — as executive director of the Christian Service Center for Central Florida — amid a major leadership shake-up for Orlando’s nonprofit safety net that also includes the Coalition for the
Homeless of Central Florida and United Against Poverty.
After 25 years at the helm, Stuart will officially step down Tuesday. Taking over will be Eric Gray, 44, the former executive director of United Against Poverty Orlando and a leading voice in advocating for the region’s large
number of working poor. Gray’s last day there was May 15.
Both Stuart and John Hearn, who has led the Coalition for the Homeless since 2016, announced last October that they planned to retire. But the coronavirus pandemic threatened to rewrite the timetable.
“I always said I was going to stay until I felt like it’s the right time to leave,” Stuart said. “And now that things have sort of settled down, we’re moving forward. … I’m really excited to see what will happen with the center in the next 20 to 25 years.”
At the coalition, Hearn — a certified public accountant who spent 16 years as chief financial officer for the Orlando Utilities Commission — will step down
June 1. Initially hired as the interim president and CEO, he helped lead the nonprofit through the closure of its mold-plagued Women’s Residential and Counseling Center and the relocation of residents there to private apartments and the main campus.
“For three decades, the coalition has been able to evolve and adapt to the changing needs — and the changing faces — of the homeless in our community,” said Hearn, 67.
Allison Krall, a 20-year-employee of the coalition — first as controller and for the past decade as its chief operating officer — will replace Hearn. She’ll be the first woman to head the region’s largest homeless shelter since its original director, Jean Marie Worrall, retired in 1999.
“I am so excited about the opportunity,” Krall said, acknowledging the challenge ahead as the region’s unemployment soars and the future of federal funding for homelessness is uncertain. “This [coronavirus] crisis has completely changed our operations three times in the last two months as we’ve addressed various safety concerns. Everything we do has been COVID-related. … I think now we’re just starting to look at the future and how we move forward.”
Gray agreed.
“The job is going to be tough,” he said. “The Christian Service Center is working in the trenches as much as anybody in town — in the middle of downtown, in one of the most dynamic parts of the city, struggling with mostly homeless clients. And the city is desperate to develop some more cutting-edge solutions … The next stage for the center is looking at existing work and making sure that can be sustained while figuring out what we can add that will be the most impactful for the community.”
United Against Poverty is currently interviewing candidates to replace Gray.
At the service center, he’ll head an operation that offers Orlando’s only fulltime soup kitchen, providing hot meals to several hundred people a day, as well as an emergency assistance program for Orange County residents struggling to cover rent, utilities, food and clothing.
For the past 10 years, the center also has run the Love Pantry, providing free groceries that school children from low-income families can take home.
“When I was 41 and taking over, I was like, ‘OK, get out of the way. Let’s move,’” Stuart said. And Eric is the same way. I’m thrilled about his leadership. He reminds me of me.”