The University City District Board of Directors appointed Lewis C. Wendell to the position of executive director yesterday.
Wendell will serve as the third executive director of the group.
Founded in 1997, UCD is an independent, non-profit organization that aims at improving safety and the quality of life in the area. It receives a majority of its funding from the University.
Omar Blaik, a UCD board member and chairman of the search committee for a new director, said the group has been looking at candidates for several months.
Blaik said Wendell's experience and consistency in his work separated him from the other applicants.
"He has experience in urban areas; he's worked in areas of development, in real estate development, in urban planning," Blaik said.
Previously, Wendell served as deputy commissioner of development for the city of New Rochelle in New York.
Blaik said the UCD had recently refrained from establishing concrete future plans until selecting a new director but that it will now move forward rapidly with new projects.
