Amy Weintraub, a community organizer and an activist in East End affairs, will be the next executive director of Covenant House.

Covenant House officials made the announcement Thursday, choosing Weintraub from among 24 candidates. She won out among three finalists, all from Charleston, said board Chairman David Sudbeck. A fourth finalist withdrew before the interviews.

Weintraub’s salary will fall somewhere in between $55,000 and $65,000, the range advertised for the job.

Covenant House came into being when the Rev. Jim Lewis and others at St. John’s Episcopal Church wanted to provide the poor and homeless a place where they could get counseling, pick up mail, take showers and do laundry.

For most of its history, Covenant House occupied a building adjacent to the church before moving five years ago into new and bigger quarters on Shrewsbury Street.

Weintraub will succeed Pat Hussey and Barbara Ferraro, who have led the nonprofit group since they came to the organization in 1981 when they were still nuns. They subsequently left their religious order rather than recant their support for a dialogue on reproductive rights. The two will retire here at yearend and move back to New England, where they will be near family and expect to find new jobs. “For 25 years, they have led this organization with integrity, energy, commitment, and passion,” Sudbeck said. “We cannot dare compare Amy Weintraub to Pat and Barbara; however we trust she will walk a comparable path but to her own cadence.”

Weintraub, 38, will officially take over on Jan. 1, but will begin working alongside Hussey and Ferraro in September.

She is married to Marc Weintraub, a lawyer and Charleston city councilman. They live with their two children, ages 4 and 7, in the East End.

Weintraub, who has served on Covenant House’s governing board, grew up in the First Baptist Church of Spencer, married a Jewish man, and now attends the local Unitarian church. She said her own spiritual journey ties into the multi-faith pillar that helps support Covenant House.

“It is a little ironic and very sobering for me to realize Amy will lead Covenant House at the same age I was when I arrived in Charleston in 1981,” Ferraro said in a prepared statement. “I trust that she will continue a tradition of caring for the most vulnerable, while working for social change. Her youth, vitality, tolerance and respect for people ...will serve her well as she continues to learn on this journey.”

“Amy is passionate...,” Hussey added. “She is driven, well-prepared and does things right. While we loved the last 25 years and Covenant House was our life, in Amy we see someone who may eat and drink of this mission.”