Julien G. Colvin

Julien G. Colvin, who spent decades developing housing for low-income families and coordinated Baltimore's first dollar-house homesteading project, on Stirling Street in East Baltimore, died of dementia January 5. He was 83.

In the 1970's, Mr. Colvin worked in Baltimore City Hall in the administration of Mayor William Donald Schaefer developing multipurpose centers around the city.

In the late 1970's, he became the founding director of Neighborhood Rental Services, a subsidiary of Neighborhood Housing Services. Under his direction the organization acquired and renovated more than 100 vacant rowhouses in the Patterson Park area for low-income rental housing.

Julien Grable Colvin, was born November 15, 1942, in Monongahela, Pa. His father was a businessman and his mother taught developmentally disabled children before her marriage. His father died when Mr. Colvin was 10, and his mother moved the family to Clearwater, Fla.

At Clearwater High School, Mr. Colvin was president of the student council and graduated in 1960. In 1959, he won the national Oratorical Award from the Sons of the American Revolution for an essay on Robert Morris, a Revolutionary War hero..

He graduated cum laude from Brown University in 1964 and then received a divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York in 1968.

In 1970 he moved to Baltimore to become associate pastor of St. Augustine Lutheran Church in Fells Point, serving a congregation from the nearby Perkins Homes public housing project. He left that post for the Baltimore Department of Housing.

After a stint as a real estate agent and an appraiser, Mr. Colvin worked for the Enterprise Social Investment Corporation, underwriting the development of affordable housing nationally using the federal low-income housing tax credit program. He worked extensively with Native American Communities developing housing on reservations. He wound up his career doing similar work for the National Equity Fund.

"He was an exceptional person, witty, worldly and strongly service-oriented", said his son David Colvin."He inspired me and others to try to lift up people who were less fortunate than us."

In retirement he continued his efforts through volunteer work with The Resource Exchange, a faith-based all volunteer organization that gathered furnishings for homeless people moving into permanent housing.

After graduate school, Mr. Colvin taught English and lived in Ghana, Senegal and Swaziland before moving to Baltimore.

He is survived by his wife of 44 years, JoAnn Copes, of Baltimore; four sons, Charles Colvin, of Bloomington, Minnesota, David Colvin, of Falls Church, Virginia, Julien C. Corven, of Bloomington, Illinois, Nicholas Colvin, of Hunt Valley and six grandchildren.

His marriage to Lucie (Gallistel) Seward ended in divorce.

Interment will be private.

A memorial service will be held in the spring.