Having worked at United South End Settlements (USES) on and off in various capacities over the past 25 years, Kevin Hepner, with his wavy silver hair and ever-present bow tie, has become in many South Enders' minds synonymous with USES. As he wraps up his six-and-a-half year tenure as president and CEO of USES on June 26 to join Roxbury Community College (RCC) as Vice President of Finance and Administration, Hepner is sanguine about USES and its future. On his decision to leave, he reflected, "It's really hard to pinpoint exactly when that moment hit. It was probably six months ago when I realized I have a birthday coming up, and you realize if you are going to make a change you have to do it." After a week's vacation in between jobs, Hepner will get to work at RCC on July 7. He took stock of his impact on USES in a recent interview in his third-floor offices at USES's Harriet Tubman House.

A native of Pennsylvania's Amish region, Hepner was prepared for a career as a certified public accountant in a private firm before discovering the charms of the Bay State and the world of non-profits. Recalling how he found his way here, he said, "What I like about Massachusetts is the politics. I discovered Cape Cod in my mid 20s during my coming out period. I learned about Provincetown, which was whispered about in Pennsylvania. With all the time I was spending there, I wound up meeting someone who put me in touch with a search firm for CPAs. At that time, there was such a shortage of CPAs in the greater Boston area that when they heard there was a CPA who wanted to move here, they set up a bunch of interviews for me." Hepner entered the non-profit world fortuitously. "I came here to continue my career with an accounting firm, and then I got tired of public accounting. Someone introduced me to Frieda Garcia, who was chair of Boston Foundation. She was looking for someone to come to USES to modernize the administrative functions." After a series of conversations, Garcia lured Hepner to his first stint at USES as Vice President for Finance and Administration in 1989. He reminisced, "When I came here the first time, there were three computers: one for the business manager, one for the Director of Development and one for Frieda's executive assistant." USES's leap into the computer age was not confined to internal operations. "At the time I was a certified systems administrator. In the first six months, I installed the first computer network and we trained all of the support staff. At the same time we got a grant to put in the first community computer center. Today we have three." Hepner also updated the Harriet Tubman House with a new roof and climate control system.

In 1994, Hepner left USES for a position at Federated Dorchester Neighborhood Houses, returning to USES in 1998 at Garcia's request as Executive Vice President to head a capital campaign that resulted in major updates to both the Harriet Tubman House and USES's 48 Rutland Street location. After Garcia retired from USES, Hepner left to work at the Judge Baker Children's Center in 2002, returning in January 2008 to assume his current position. Among Hepner's goals was to give USES's programming a more outward focus, with a broader range of activities and services for seniors, individuals and families. "When I came (to USES), I felt the organization had become way too internally focused. My goal was to make it an externally focused organization, much more connected and responsive to community needs. I wanted to implement a client data tracking system to measure outcomes and impact," Hepner explained. He set about initiating educational and career-skills courses. "If you really want to make a difference in people's lives, you have to give them skills to earn a decent living. One of my goals was to expand workforce readiness, which we've really increased in the last six years. We've added Transition to College, we've beefed up our technology education programs and we've added ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages)," Hepner said.

Hepner's expansion of senior programs is a matter of both practicality and pride for him. "One of my things for seniors is that when you look at spiraling cost of health care and 60 per cent of disease is preventable, what are we doing to keep seniors healthy and engaged? My philosophy is, 'You might retire from your job, but you don't get to retire from life and you don't get to retire from the community.' We've been very intentional in opportunities to keep seniors active in community life," Hepner said. Under Hepner's leadership, USES has created programs such as the Platinum Singers, a senior singing class that has done cross-generational performances with the Boston Children's Choir and other youth groups; senior wellness, balance and exercise classes; and senior technology classes. Hepner emphasizes inter-generational partnership. "We have seniors who are involved in other programs such as the ESOL program, where students practice their writing by interviewing seniors and writing their life histories."

Renting office space at the Harriet Tubman House to outside groups, a measure Hepner established to generate income, has led to a lively mix of neighbors including the Tenant Development Corporation and a Montessori program, as well as to serendipitous alliances. One tenant is the Prime Timers, a seniors group for gay men that participates in USES's senior activities. Hepner marveled, "To see the senior exercise class, which is mostly African American women, with this handful of gay white men and to watch the relationships that form is quite amazing."

Part of Hepner's outward focus has been to invite creative endeavors from the community into the Harriet Tubman House. With the display of art on the walls of the Harriet Tubman Gallery and the many successful book launches that have been held in the atrium for titles from Michael Bronski's "A Queer History of the United States" to Hope Shannon's and Alison Barnet's recent tomes on South End history, Hepner has been working to make the Harriet Tubman House "the neighborhood's living room."

On the subject of his potential successor, Hepner is pragmatic. "In my conversations with the board, I made it clear they should appoint an interim leader. Changes like this are opportunities to reassess where we are, the strategic plan for the next body of work, what we want to happen in the next three to five years, and what are the most important skill sets we want the next person to have. By having an interim in place, keeping the day to day going, it gives the board the opportunity to do that thinking. I've encouraged the board to think beyond Boston. I've been involved at the national level, and there are people doing exciting things in different places. I've encouraged them to tap into that network and think about some of those people. You never know who's originally from Boston and might be looking to come home, but has a big vision," Hepner observed.

Although he will no longer be working in the South End, Hepner will remain active in the neighborhood as a member of the Harriet Tubman Park committee and a board member of the Friends of Titus Sparrow Parks, as treasurer of the South End Business Alliance and as a member of the Worcester Street Community Garden.

Hepner's new position at RCC will have a ring of familiarity in that he will be joining some respected colleagues, such as the chairman of RCC's board, whom Hepner has known for about 20 years. "What I like about him is that if he were not serious about doing the job, he wouldn't have taken it. That he accepted the role as new board chair means he is committed. He called RCC's new president, Valerie Roberson, "A dynamo. I'm very impressed."

Hepner's friend and former colleague on the South End Community Health Center's board of directors, Jovita Fontanez, assessed his contributions to USES and her hopes for his future. "On one hand, he's done a tremendous job of moving USES forward and providing great programs. He's enhanced the programs for seniors. They've got classes in painting, jazz exercise, tai chi and balance and a lot of things for seniors now and it is excellent!" She continued, "It's not just senior programs, it's also the fact that the facility is used for so many things. So many neighborhood groups have meetings there. It's a space that is being used by the public, and I think that is an asset not only to the South End but to USES itself." Fontanez added, "I am delighted to see Kevin bring his skills and his caring to RCC. Going to RCC is not only a great move for Kevin. RCC has been a dream for many people in the city, but it has not reached its potential. My hope is that with Kevin's rolodex and experience, he will be a tremendous asset to the relatively new president."

His mentor, Garcia, offered her thoughts on Hepner's evolution since she brought him into the world of non-profit leadership as well as his prospects at RCC. At the beginning, Garcia said, "We both took a risk that he was going to leave. It was a little risky for both of us to hire a CPA because they don't always understand the nonprofit world, but in this case it worked out very well. He was just fantastic. When he left, we stayed very much in touch. He's been (at USES) for 25 years: not consecutively, but he's always been involved. He learned very quickly and more important, he really grasped the whole settlement house philosophy and took it a step further than I did. As CEO, he joined the national organization and cultivated it. He attended the meetings of the United Neighborhood Associations of America." She continued, "He never left the nonprofit world and he could have because there is a great demand and need for people with his skills. That he stayed involved in nonprofit speaks to how much he loves and understands it."