Learn more about their stories in the interviews below:

Chadwick Campbell
Underwriting Counsel, Thomas Title & Escrow

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your service in the military.
I am an Underwriting Counsel for Thomas Title & Escrow.  I started my military service as an Air Force ROTC cadet at Duke University, and then served on active duty as an aircraft maintenance officer at RAF Lakenheath in England.  I separated from service as a Captain, and started law school at the University of Arizona.

Why are you a member of ULI?
The educational and networking opportunities with ULI are unmatched.  ULI Arizona is very active, and draws in diverse and engaged people from a variety of professions.  I am in my fifth year of the ULI NEXT program, and have enjoyed every minute of it.

What inspired you to join the military, and how has that experience shaped you?
I was always deeply respectful and thankful to my grandfathers and uncle, who all served in the military.  When I was in high school, every time I was able to choose a book to read, it was a biography of a military leader. I was excited to serve my country (and the ROTC scholarship for college didn’t hurt either!)

What do you wish non-veterans knew or understood better about serving in the military and/or veterans in general?
People often thank me for my service.  I love when this happens, but at first, I never knew what to say in return.  Now, I just thank them back—I value the appreciation they have for our military members and veterans.

Tell us a little bit about your firm and the type of work you do.
Thomas Title & Escrow is the national commercial services operation for Stewart Title in Arizona—we close and insure commercial real estate transactions.  I wear two hats at Thomas:  I am an underwriting counsel and a business developer.

How has your military experience influenced your professional life?
Discipline and perspective.  I have always been a fairly disciplined person, but serving in the military solidified and amplified the value of that trait. When I was 23 years old, I was responsible for 115 men and women.  Nowadays, when I start to feel stressed about a transaction or a deadline, I think back to launching fighter jets in the Middle East.  That’s always a good reality check.

Is there anything else you’d like to share about your service, your firm, or your experience with ULI?
I have been a veteran for 20 years now, but I still feel a strong connection to my service (maybe it’s nostalgia!), and to the military.  In 2021, I co-founded a nonprofit called The Land At Home Project, which helps veterans transition from military service into sustainable agriculture.  It has been very rewarding to create something that supports fellow veterans.

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Alex Popovic
Regional VP of Development, The Richman Group

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your service in the military.
Alex Popovic joined the United States Marine Corps in 1993 and served honorably until June 2001. During that time, he served in a Force Reconnaissance Company as Reconnaissance Man Scuba/Airborne qualified and as a Scout/Sniper. His last three years in the Marine Corps he served as a Scout/Sniper instructor at Quantico. He was recalled to active duty after 9-11 for Operation Enduring Freedom from 2002-2005 and was attached to an Army Special Operations Unit as a weapons and demolition expert in January of 2005 he was honorably discharged for a second time.

Why are you a member of ULI?
ULI provides a fantastic opportunity for industry participants to network and bring innovative new ideas from a variety of backgrounds.  It is an amazing organization that has a variety of committees and tools for its members to participate in and provide insight

What inspired you to join the military, and how has that experience shaped you?
Ever since I was a young boy early enough to recall I wanted to join the military.  As an immigrant who came here legally, I could think of no higher calling than to serve and defend this great nation. It was an absolute honor that instilled disciplines and traits that continue to help me even in development and dealing with difficult challenges

What do you wish non-veterans knew or understood better about serving in the military and/or veterans in general?
Many veterans struggle with adjusting into the civilian world and corporate structure particularly newly separated service members. They offer incredible grit and tenacity and will do about anything to succeed, if trained and guided properly they will be your most committed employee.

Tell us a little bit about your firm and the type of work you do.
The Richman Group was founded in 1986 by Richard Richman we are the nation’s 7^th largest residential apartment owner. Vertically integrated, privately held with 4 core businesses: Invest banking/syndication; Development; Construction; Property Management. We develop and hold long term:  Senior, Independent, Affordable, Mixed-Income, Public Housing and Market Rate projects

How has your military experience influenced your professional life?
Some of my closest friends from over 30+ years ago are still my closest friends. When you were a part of a very small percent of a small percent of those who served via Special Operations Unit your bonds are forged in blood, sweat and tears, and doing things when you were young that you look back on and smile at how crazy some of the things you did were.

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Jesse Westad
Principal Landscape Architect,  WERK | urban design

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your service in the military.
I joined the Army in 1998 with the goal to make a positive impact on the world and was given the opportunity to get paid to jump out of airplanes and become a paratrooper. In 2003 MTV was hosting Spring Break Nasiriyah, Iraq so I decided to join Carson Daly and then the follow-up year in Kandahar, Afghanistan as well. The goal of those early war efforts was about rebuilding communities…to various degrees of success. When I returned from deployment, my second enlistment was ending and there seemed to be a falling out with me, Carson Daly and the MTV crew so I decided to be a kid, get out, and go to ASU after serving 6 ½ years. At ASU I learned about a unicorn degree field that hit on many of the goals that we were trying to achieve overseas with less people shooting at you. It focused on creating resilient, culturally sensitive, community led, healthier, more sustainable communities. It just had a horrible name which made me think I was taking care of my grandma’s rose bushes… However, Landscape Architecture allowed me to work for an amazing firm in Kimley-Horn, travel across the country designing amazing projects, and eventually lead me to starting my own firm in 2016, WERK | urban design. Obviously, I was going to replace landscape architecture with urban design 😉

Why are you a member of ULI?
Although ULI and the military have different primary purposes, they share common principles of teamwork, diversity, leadership, and a commitment to making a positive impact on the world. The people that I have been introduced to and the bonds that I’ve created over the years have been invaluable to me professionally while serving as a sounding board for my career and my firm. If it wasn’t for ULI Partnership Forum and then more importantly ULI NEXT, I can unequivocally say that WERK | urban design would not exist today!

You have a pretty inspiring story about multiple members of your family serving in the military at the same time. Will you share that with us?
My Dad was Army EOD (Explosive Ordinance Disposal) or bomb squad for you civilian types, so I grew up as a degenerate Army brat. Seeing all of the opportunities that my Dad was given and getting the chance to grow up in Germany and across the U.S. inspired my three sisters, my brother, and I to enter the family business as well. The fact that my older brother who played college football, blew his knee out in basic training and quit was just icing on the cake that we still bring up 3 decades later, especially when my littlest sister made it through… #sorrynotsorrySam

What do you wish non-veterans knew or understood better about serving in the military and/or veterans in general?
The Army is the best job in the world because regardless of your cultural, socioeconomic, or racial differences, the emphasis on training, discipline, and trust in your comrades to ensure each other’s safety and the accomplishment of your mission fosters a sense of belonging. These experiences shape a soldier’s perspective that they’ll carry throughout their lives because of all the crazy SOB’s they served with and got them out of tough situations. The culture shock isn’t when you get back to the states, it’s when you leave the guys that you counted on and enter civilian life.

Tell us a little bit about WERK Urban Design and the type of work you do?
We can check all the boxes through the Federal, Municipal, and Private Development side. What sets us apart is our focus on creating actual sustainable projects. That starts at a code and policy side such as the Lake Havasu City LID Master Plan or our current work on the Resilient Tempe Master Plan where we are focused on creating new codes and standards to promote greywater or rainwater harvesting usage onsite without extra cost to a developer. It also means creating pilot projects to gain the trust of city staff to allow for code changes. When creating projects that go against the status quo, they need to be successful, but they also need to be replicable, maintainable, and affordable through a triple bottom line analysis. Stop double paying for water, your plants don’t need clean drinking water, trust me. They’ll take your dirty shower water, just send it to them within 24 hours so you don’t have to treat it. They’ll also take your oil filled street runoff and clean it for you before you send it to the adjacent creek or lake and create an algae bloom that shuts everything down. We love the term of creating “sponge cities” and creating an urban ecology that promotes a sense of place. Designing with nature only helps your bottom line, not over-engineered “sustainable” options. If you’re hiring me to just “shrub it up” you’ve already screwed up, because the benefit we bring is finding nature-based solutions to code requirements.

Is there anything else you’d like to share about your service, your firm, or your experience with ULI?
¾ of the world is covered in water, the rest is just drop zone….. Airborne!