Both sides of the dais
Advice from people who
have actually
done it.
We have voted on these projects, regulated them, brokered them and built them. Pick the seat you are sitting in.
How we advise
We can’t predict the future. We can predict the room.
Public, private, nonprofit or philanthropic, every decision gets made in a room. We know the questions that room will ask and where a deal or a partnership is likely to break, because we have sat on every side of the table. We have not spent our careers writing theoretical reports. We have been too busy doing the work those reports describe. So when we do put something on paper, it is grounded in lived experience, practical knowledge and serious academic preparation. That is what you are hiring. Not a study that sits on a shelf, but judgment you can take into the meeting.
Flagship practice
Data centers and emerging industries.
Ten years ago it was wind. Five years ago solar. Today data centers, and battery storage is already at the door.
The problem
The loudest twenty become the record
A council votes on the only evidence it has, and half the town believes it was never heard.
What we do
Find out what the town actually thinks
A statistically representative assessment, not an open survey that only the angry fill in.
Why a third party
The city is no longer believed
And the applicant never was. Education has to come from someone with nothing to gain.
The full service line, seven services and six stipulations →
Who is asking
Four doors. Same standard.
The doors follow where you sit in relation to the decision: who decides, who asks, who lives with it, and who advises or finances it. Some services appear under more than one door on purpose. You should find what you need where you are looking, not where we filed it.
Public Sector
Cities, counties, districts, agencies
- Community engagement
- Data center & emerging industry engagement
- Public hearing facilitation
- Stakeholder alignment workshops
- Urban planning & analysis
- Infrastructure consulting
- Housing needs assessments
- Disparate impact analysis
- Community health & housing
- Legislative & regulatory advocacy
Developers & Owners
People carrying the same risk we do
- Market analysis & feasibility
- Deal structuring & P3s
- Owners representative
- Due diligence & acquisition
- Year 15 LIHTC strategy
- HFA / QAP strategy
- Predictive site selection
- Community-developer mediation
Community & Institutions
The people who live with the decision
- Neighborhood and resident engagement
- Association and coalition support
- Faith based partnership structuring
- Grant writing & applications
- Housing needs assessments
- Feasibility studies
Legal, Lenders & Fiduciaries
When it is already contested
- Expert witness & litigation support
- Receivership & distressed assets
- Due diligence
What cities have brought before him
He has sat in the chair your council is sitting in.
Eight years on the Kansas City Council: four as vice chair and four as chair of the Planning, Zoning and Economic Development Committee, and vice chair of Budget and Audit. Then 2014 to 2019 on the city’s Tax Increment Financing Commission. Kansas City covers 313.5 square miles of land, 13th largest by land area among U.S. cities of 100,000 or more in the 2000 Census.
Incentives and oversight
As the new chair he took on the city’s development incentive policy, then moved to make sure abatements from the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority were not abused.
Kansas City Business Journal, June 13, 2003 ↗Tax increment financing
His committee granted HCA Inc.’s request to activate the rest of the Southtown tax increment financing district.
Kansas City Business Journal, February 19, 2004 ↗A downtown district built on public bonds
He chaired the committee as the council tied the city’s fortunes to the Power & Light District by issuing more than $295 million in bonds in 2005 and 2006.
Kansas City Business Journal, December 22, 2006 ↗A 12-block redevelopment
The East Village plan for a 12-block area east of City Hall came before his committee, with state financing still to secure.
Kansas City Business Journal, January 11, 2006 ↗A neighborhood that said no
Residents gathered some 3,000-plus signatures against a plan to demolish the Seven Oaks Shopping Center and Leon’s Thriftway. He introduced the ordinance to keep it.
The Call, October 8, 2004 ↗The largest development project in Missouri history
He served on the TIF Commission when it unanimously approved the amended agreement for Cerner’s campus, reimbursing about $1.75 billion of $4.45 billion in costs.
Kansas City Star, April 13, 2016 ↗The conflict rule
We develop and we advise. Never both on the same deal.
Every developer we advise asks the same question, usually without saying it out loud. So we answer it first, in writing, before anyone signs anything.
Six conditions, no exceptions
- Findings are public, on a date set before work begins.
- We do not advocate. No testimony, no appearing as your representative.
- The jurisdiction is told first, including who is paying.
- Our name goes on the method, never the outcome.
- No contingency fee, ever. A contingent fee buys a conclusion.
- One side per project. Applicant or jurisdiction, never both.
Why it comes to us
The room is already full when they call.
By the time a jurisdiction looks for help, the public has usually stopped trusting the city, nobody knows who the loud voices speak for, and no one in the room can say what the use actually does. None of that is fixed by another meeting.
Of the ten largest affordable housing developers in the country, none advertises advisory services to outside clients. Of the consultancies that advise on housing, not one has ever carried development risk. We do both, and we publish the rule that keeps them apart.
Developer rankings: Affordable Housing Finance, Top 50 Affordable Housing Developers of 2025.
Why this is hard to copy
One buyer put the ranking in writing
This is not the firm’s opinion about how it should be judged. At least one public buyer writes the order down.
The regional planning organization lists its evaluation criteria and says they are applied “in order of priority”. First is specialized experience and technical competence. Second is understanding of the project. Third is references from previous work. Total project cost is listed last.
Not every buyer ranks it that way, and some name cost first. But where a buyer publishes the order, competing on price alone answers the criterion it put last.
Source: Mid-America Regional Council, Request for Proposals, Hazards and Vulnerability Analysis, section I, read 17 September 2026.
Resource library
The National Data Center Resource Library
Sources on data centers from federal agencies, state legislatures, local governments, researchers and the industry itself. A sample is open now; the full library comes with The Nash Group Data Center Briefing.
Tell us which seat you are sitting in.
We will tell you honestly whether you need us, and which part.