Credo: Terry Lynch

When Terry Lynch was an undergraduate at Georgetown University, a homeless man in his neighborhood died of hypothermia. The death spurred Lynch to visit street heating vents around the city, taking food and blankets to the homeless people that slept there. He wound up starting a shelter at Calvary Baptist Church — volunteer work that led to his job as director of the Downtown Cluster of Congregations, where he has worked for 27 years. An oft-quoted figure in D.C. politics, Lynch makes a habit of touring the city on foot, looking for people who need help or neighborhoods in disrepair. “That’s my hobby,” he says, “to fix the town.”