Over the last 25 years Keith has researched and published on urban regeneration, local and regional governance, and the community and voluntary sectors. He has also had extensive experience of working for governmental and non-governmental organisations in relation to project and programme evaluations, voluntary and community sector involvement, neighbourhood governance and local partnership working. This included involvement in the National Evaluation of the New Deal for Communities Programme as Regional Coordinator for the North East, evaluator of the West Middlesbrough NDC and co-author of the case study report on Liveability in NDC areas.
Keith has also conducted evaluations of Urban Development Corporations (for the JRF Foundation); City Challenge (for Sunderland City Challenge); SRB programmes (for three local authorities in the North East) and Housing Action Trusts (for the DETR). He was part of two major assessments of the role of the Economic and Social Partners group within the North East Assembly, and worked on several reviews of voluntary sector infrastructure organisations in the North East.
Most recently, Keith has been involved in the EU CONNECTIONS project (on Social Inclusion) which involved a number of European cities including Rotterdam, Munich, Budapest, Vienna, Oslo and Newcastle. He is a member of the Government Office/RDA Academic Advisory Panel for the North East and now sit on the management board of the North East Institute for Local Governance. With Professor Fred Robinson of Durham University, Keith has recently been awarded a grant from the Millfield House Foundation to undertake a project on From ‘Regionalism’ to ‘Localism’: Opportunities and Threats for the North East.