Melanie French Named Board Chair of Entryway as Founder Chris Finlay Transitions Leadership
Entryway, the national nonprofit working to break the cycle of homelessness and poverty through the multifamily industry, is entering a new chapter of leadership. RR Living CEO Melanie French has been named Board Chair, with longtime industry leader Doug Bibby stepping in as Vice Chair. The transition comes from the organization's founder, Chris Finlay, who is moving off the board after building Entryway — formerly known as Shelters to Shutters — into one of the most distinctive workforce and housing organizations in the sector.
Finlay framed the move as a decision made from strength, not necessity.
"Today, I'm announcing that I'm transitioning the chairmanship of Entryway. Melanie French will become board chair, and Doug Bibby joining as vice chair. I want to be direct about why this is happening now: the organization is in the strongest position it has ever been, and these are exactly the leaders to take it further. While I'll be stepping off the board, I won't be stepping away from this mission — I remain as engaged and vocal an advocate as ever."
A mission built on the industry's own strengths
Entryway's model is deceptively simple and quietly radical: rather than treating homelessness and employment as separate problems, it uses the multifamily industry itself as the bridge out of housing insecurity. The organization sources, screens, trains, and places motivated individuals into on-site apartment jobs, pairing them with employment, housing, and career-training opportunities through a national network of property owners and operators. For the people it serves, a single placement can deliver both a paycheck and a home at the same time. For the industry, it creates a pipeline of committed, well-prepared talent in a field that consistently needs it.
That dual value — changing lives while strengthening the business — has defined the organization since Finlay founded it, and it is the through-line the incoming leadership inherits.
The right leaders for the next phase
Melanie French brings to the role a career built on scaling operations without losing the human center of the work. As RR Living's first Chief Executive Officer, she leads a Dallas-based multifamily and build-to-rent platform serving tens of thousands of residents, and she has long championed the idea that operational excellence and genuine care are not competing priorities but the same strategy. Across earlier executive roles at Cortland, AIMCO, and DLP Capital, she grew management platforms from thousands of units into tens of thousands and led learning and organizational development for portfolios spanning hundreds of thousands of homes. Her path began as a leasing consultant — an origin she often cites as the source of her belief that apartments are meant to become long-term homes, and that the industry holds a unique power to change lives.
Joining her as Vice Chair, Doug Bibby is one of the most respected figures in American rental housing. He served as President of the National Multifamily Housing Council for more than two decades, representing an industry of thousands of member firms on Capitol Hill and before regulatory agencies, and was inducted into the Multifamily Executive Hall of Fame in recognition of that work. Before NMHC, he spent 16 years as a senior officer at Fannie Mae. Bibby joined Entryway's national board in 2023, bringing relationships and institutional knowledge that few in the sector can match — assets that position the organization to keep scaling its training and placement operations.
Continuity, not departure
While Finlay is stepping off the board, his message made clear that his commitment to the cause is unchanged. His founding vision — that the same work that turns apartments into homes can help people rebuild their own lives — remains the organization's north star. With French chairing the board, Bibby as her partner in leadership, and Finlay continuing as an advocate, Entryway heads into its next phase with both fresh energy and deep continuity.
For an organization whose entire premise is that opportunity, once extended, tends to multiply, the leadership transition reads less like an ending and more like exactly what it was designed to do: hand the work to the next set of capable hands, and keep going.
