James Kelly, longtime director of local African American advocacy group, the Seattle Urban League, is stepping down after 11 years.

A press statement says:

James Kelly, 56, announced this morning that he will be leaving his post in April after a search for a replacement has been completed. “I love this work of the League – and I love being a player at the table of every major jobs, education, public safety, transportation and public policy issue to face the area. But after 11 years, it’s time to move on, move out and move into other areas that I haven’t ever had time, energy, or the chance to do,” he said in a release today.

Kelly is credited with getting the former Colman School site converted into the highly-acclaimed African American Museum, growing the League’s housing, jobs and education programs into one of the most productive in the nation, and being a key political advisor to state, local and regional leaders. His initiatives into youth violence are perceived as critical in the dramatic decline in gang-related youth deaths in the area. A leading advocate of the Streetcar expansion, Kelly took the Urban League into transportation issues as “alternative access to transportation is critical to jobs and a decent education.”

Recently, Kelly has been an outspoken advocate of the deep bore tunnel.