Build Philly Now (BPN) is an economic development think tank in Philadelphia dedicated to building more of the things a growing city needs to thrive: housing, transportation, and energy.
We believe pro-growth politics and pro-worker politics belong together. Housing, transportation, and energy are the three biggest costs in most families’ budgets, and building more of all three creates jobs and opportunity — and brings those costs down. That’s our message.
BPN grew out of Philadelphia 3.0, a nonprofit and PAC formed in 2014 to support independent candidates for Philadelphia City Council. Since 2023, we’ve been doing something different: spending less time running candidates and more time building coalitions, bringing together the advocates, developers, and trades who want to see Philadelphia grow and giving them a shared institutional home.
Most pro-housing and pro-growth advocacy talks over organized labor. We don’t. Our board includes leadership from IBEW Local 98 and the Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters. We run the 30,000 Homes housing advocacy table with housing developers, building trades, and mission-driven organizations. And we work with the Parker and Shapiro administrations, City Council members, and state legislators who want to make Philadelphia a city that builds.
BPN has three core functions: we convene, we research, and we report. The convening brings together cross-sector alliances — connecting people and organizations who share a stake in pro-growth outcomes and getting them in front of the decision-makers who can act on our shared vision. That means hosting the conversations that don’t happen elsewhere and building an analytical home that advocates, practitioners, and policymakers can take seriously. BPN’s research and reporting supply the information that makes every layer of our network more effective: original journalism for people who need to know what’s happening, policy analysis for people shaping the agenda, and an innovative data dashboard that puts the planning intelligence usually reserved for insiders in the hands of anyone who needs it.
What we produce
- Original reporting and analysis on housing, transportation, energy, and economic development — covering City Council, state legislation, city hearings, and the development projects reshaping Philadelphia’s neighborhoods.
- A property data dashboard at map.buildphillynow.org — making the information insiders use to track development projects accessible to everyone.
- Policy analysis and advocacy to improve the regulatory environment for building.
- A biweekly policy lunch series connecting advocates, practitioners, and policymakers across our issue areas.
- A growing coalition of influential actors — organized labor, housing advocates, developers, and urbanists — working together on shared policy priorities from a broad spectrum of ideologies, issue areas, and industries.
Who we are
Alison Perelman is the Executive Director of Build Philly Now, and has served in the same role for Philadelphia 3.0 since 2014. A former City Council staffer with a PhD in Political Communication, Perelman has led numerous electoral and advocacy campaigns at the municipal level. She has served on the Board of Directors and Executive Committee of Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia for the past five years, and on the Board of Directors of the Rendell Center for Civics and Civic Education for the past seven years. Prior to that, she served on the Board and Executive Committees of the Forum of Executive Women for seven years.
Jon Geeting is the Director of Policy and Advocacy for Build Philly Now, and has served as Director of Engagement for Philadelphia 3.0 since 2016. A former journalist with WHYY’s PlanPhilly, Geeting has spent more than a decade building the coalitions and policy networks that shape Philadelphia’s housing and transportation debates. He is a co-founder of 5th Square, the urbanist political action committee, and of the Transit Forward Philly coalition, where he serves on the Executive Committee.
Philadelphia has never had a real institutional home for pro-growth politics. We know what it takes to move the needle in this city — and we’re building the tools to do it at scale.
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