Kimble appointed as new Northampton Housing Authority director

NORTHAMPTON — Northampton Housing Authority acting Executive Director Sharon Kimble has been named to the role permanently after the authority’s Board of Commissioners voted to appoint her during its June 11 meeting.

The Northampton Housing Authority is a quasi-public agency maintaining public housing at the McDonald House, Forsadner and Cahill Apartments, Tobin Manor, Salvo House, and Hampshire and Florence Heights.

Before the vote, the Board of Commissioners interviewed four candidates for the position. The search effort was supplemented by the Massachusetts chapter of the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials. The mission of MassNAHRO is to educate, support and advocate for its member agencies to ensure the preservation, protection and expansion of public and affordable housing.

Northampton Housing Authority Board of Commissioners Chair Patty Healey told Reminder Publishing that in total, 19 applicants across eight states applied for the position before the board narrowed the options down to four candidates.

“We reviewed all of the qualifications in the resumes, the information they gave us in the interviews, and discussed what about each candidate would best meet the needs of our organization,” Healey said.

The housing authority is tasked with managing housing of the federal government under Housing and Urban Development. Featuring about 1,500 units in total, the NHA is one of the largest groups in the state.

Kimble served as acting executive director since the fall of 2025 and was the authority’s chief accounting officer before that. She has been with the organization for 14 years. Reminder Publishing did not receive a response from Kimble about her new position by print time.

Healey said Kimble offers a unique stability for the NHA due to her history with the organization and her experience in the interim role already.

“Given we had no leadership for almost a year and a half, there was concern that the housing authority needed to have a leader who could start right away and step into the role. We feel very confident that this is the right decision,” Healey added. “We’ve been able to observe and work with Sharon for the last seven, eight months or so, and what was most notable is that she has had to run this organization without a full staff. We had to think about the accomplishments that she had without a staff. That informed our decision that she was able to handle a number of crises, identify the problems and separate them, prioritize them and move forward. I would say that she also acted as an acting director during the times when the previous administrator was out on leave several times in the two years before the former director. I don’t think people realize how much she actually did.”

Healey said that Kimble’s background with NHA was a “very significant factor” in the decision. Noting that two of the three other final candidates lived out of state, Healey added that Kimble gives the organization stability following a time of inconsistency with the position.

“Given the need to be available face to face often and to understand the politics in the community of Western Mass., we thought it was pretty essential to have someone who is pretty local,” she added.