Conference Speakers

Deborah “Debbie” Matz was nominated by President Barack Obama to serve as the eighth board chair of the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA). After confirmation by the U.S. Senate on August 7, 2009, she was sworn in on August 24, 2009. Mrs. Matz is no stranger to NCUA and credit unions having served as a board member at NCUA from January 2002 to October 2005.

The NCUA, governed by a three-member board, is the independent federal agency that charters and supervises federal credit unions. NCUA, with the backing of the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, operates the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund (NCUSIF), insuring the deposits of 90 million account holders in all federal credit unions and many state-chartered credit unions.

As Chair of the NCUA Board, Mrs. Matz is the spokesperson for the agency and oversees the regulation of federal credit unions and the administration of the federal insurance fund covering approximately 7,400 credit unions with over $900 billion in assets. In addition to chairing the NCUA Board, Mrs. Matz serves as Chair of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC). The FFIEC was established in 1979, pursuant to an act of Congress, to prescribe uniform principles, standards, and report forms for the federal examination of financial institutions, to make recommendations to promote uniformity in the supervision of financial institutions, and to conduct schools for examiners.

Prior to becoming NCUA board chair, Mrs. Matz served on President Obama’s Economic Transition Team. From 2006 until June 2008, Mrs. Matz was the Executive Vice-President/Chief Operating Officer of a federal credit union serving 90,000 members with branches in the United States and Europe. Mrs. Matz was appointed by President Bill Clinton to serve in the U.S. Department of Agriculture from 1993 to 2001. As Deputy Assistant Secretary for Administration, she oversaw the administrative arm of the 100,000-employee agency.

Mrs. Matz has extensive experience on Capitol Hill. She served for nine years as an economist with the Congressional Joint Economic Committee where she advised Members of Congress on a wide range of domestic policy issues, and as a legislative assistant to Congressman Peter Peyser (R-NY).

She received a master’s degree from George Washington University and a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University. A native New Yorker, she is married to Marshall Matz, has two grown children and resides in McLean, Virginia.

Donna J. Gambrell has served as Director of Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund (CDFI Fund) since November 26, 2007. The CDFI Fund’s mission is to increase economic opportunity and promote community development investments for underserved populations and in distressed communities in the United States. Since its creation in 1994, the CDFI Fund has awarded more than $1.7 billion to CDFIs, community development organizations, and financial institutions through its programs.

In addition, the CDFI Fund has allocated more than $33 billion in tax credit authority through the New Markets Tax Credit Program.

Under the leadership of Ms. Gambrell, the CDFI Fund has seen significant growth, more than doubling funding under its flagship CDFI Program.

Ms. Gambrell has also overseen the implementation of several new programs which have broadened the CDFI Fund’s ability to support small business financing, affordable housing development, and financial education.

Ms. Gambrell also created the CDFI Fund’s Capacity Building Initiative, which has increased the training and technical assistance opportunities for CDFIs nationwide through a variety of focused training series.

Prior to the CDFI Fund, Ms. Gambrell spent 16 years at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation from 1991 to 2007. In her most recent position, she served as Deputy Director for Compliance and Consumer Protection where she was responsible for overseeing the FDIC’s national compliance bank examination, community affairs, consumer affairs and deposit insurance education programs.

During her tenure at the FDIC, and at the request of former FDIC Chairman Donald E. Powell, she served 18 months in the Gulf Coast Region, working on rebuilding initiatives in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, which struck the region in 2005.

Ms. Gambrell worked on site in Louisiana and Mississippi spearheading partnerships among financial institutions, government agencies and community-based organizations to promote community and economic development in areas devastated by the hurricanes, including low- and moderate-income neighborhoods.

Prior to joining the FDIC, Ms. Gambrell worked at the Resolution Trust Corporation (1989-1991), the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (1987-1989), and the U.S. Government Accountability Office (1979-1987). Ms. Gambrell received a B.S. Degree from Towson State University in Baltimore, Maryland, and an M.S. Degree from New York University.

In 2009, Ms. Gambrell was the recipient of Woodstock Institute’s Community Reinvestment Award for her steadfast leadership in community and economic development.

As chief executive officer of NeighborWorks America, Eileen Fitzgerald oversees the provision of technical assistance, financial assistance and training to over 3,000 community based organizations and oversees the support of a national network of more than 235 affordable housing and community development organizations serving over 4,000 communities. NeighborWorks America is a public nonprofit corporation established as the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corporation by an Act of Congress in 1978. [NeighborWorks America is the organization’s trade name.]

Fitzgerald became chief executive officer June 1, 2011, after serving as the acting chief executive since January 2011. She served as NeighborWorks America’s chief operating officer since June 2005, bringing nearly 20 years of experience in housing and community development to NeighborWorks America. Previously at the Fannie Mae Foundation, she was responsible for alliance and relationship management with key foundation partners as a senior director of National Initiatives. Fitzgerald has also served as the acting executive director and vice president of program operations at the McAuley Institute, a national nonprofit intermediary committed to improving the housing conditions of women and families through community-based efforts. She also served as the chief investment officer for single-family finance at the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust, a multi-billion dollar investment company, which includes assets from hundreds of pension funds. There, she was responsible for the development and rollout of HIT HOME, a home mortgage program for union members.

From 1994 to 2000, Fitzgerald served in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Housing Service as the associate administrator and acting administrator, where she was responsible for management and oversight of single-family, multi-family housing and community facilities programs. She served in both Virginia and Maryland state governments. She is a graduate of Fordham University in New York and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University.

Hubert H. (“Skip”) Humphrey joined the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) as the Assistant Director of its newly established Office for Older Americans in October 2011. He received his JD from the University of Minnesota in 1969, has practiced privately, served as a Minnesota state senator, and as the state’s attorney general. As Minnesota’s attorney general he focused on consumer protection policy and enforcement. He initiated the first anti-trust law suit against the tobacco industry resulting in the disclosure of millions of pages of documents exposing the fraud and deception of the industry.. He has taught at Harvard’s Kennedy School, Institute of Politics, and at the UM’s School of Public Health. Skip has also served in the private sector as an executive at Tunheim Partners, a communication and public policy management company in Minneapolis. He is an avid biker, and downhill skier. He and his wife Lee live in Golden Valley Minnesota where they enjoy being close to family and their 4 grandchildren.

Stephanie Rawlings-Blake was sworn in as Baltimore’s 49th mayor on February 4, 2010. In November 2011, she was elected to her first full term as Mayor, receiving 87% percent of the vote in the mayoral general election. Mayor Rawlings-Blake has focused her administration on growing Baltimore’s population by 10,000 families over the next decade by improving public safety and public education and by strengthening city neighborhoods.

Mayor Rawlings-Blake was elected to a top leadership position in the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to serve as Secretary, following the historic reelection of President Barack Obama. Mayor Rawlings-Blake also serves in key leadership positions in the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM). In 2010, she was elected by her fellow mayors to the USCM Board of Trustees. She is also a member of the Mayor’s Water Council, and the Criminal and Social Justice Standing Committee.

In 2013, Mayor Rawlings-Blake presented, Change to Grow: A Ten-Year Financial Plan for Baltimore, the City’s first long-range financial plan. The plan includes a bold set of major reforms that amount to the most significant changes to the way the City does business in generations. The plan would help achieve the mayor’s goal to grow Baltimore by 10,000 families by eliminating a nine-year $750 Million structural budget deficit; allowing new investments in neighborhood infrastructure—including repairing roads and City facilities and rebuilding ten recreation centers; and providing a funding surge for the demolition of more than 4,000 vacant homes; all while reducing homeowner property taxes by more than 20% over the next ten years.

In 2012, Mayor Rawlings-Blake worked with state leaders to pass the Civil Marriage Protection Act and subsequent state ballot initiative, allowing same-sex couples to obtain a civil marriage license in Maryland. When the new law took effect on January 1, 2013, Mayor Rawlings-Blake presided over the first same-sex marriages in Maryland’s history at a midnight ceremony at Baltimore’s City Hall.

Mayor Rawlings-Blake has also worked to make Baltimore a welcoming city for immigrants. She signed a landmark executive order to protect new Americans from discrimination and increase access to public safety resources and City services for foreign-born city residents. In addition, Mayor Rawlings-Blake fought for a successful state-wide ballot initiative, known as the Dream Act, to provide in-state tuition rates and higher education opportunities for undocumented immigrant students that attended Maryland high schools.

Rawlings-Blake served as City Council President from January 2007 to February 2010. She was first elected to the City Council in 1995, at the age of 25—the youngest person ever elected to the Baltimore City Council. She represented the council’s 5th District from 1995 to 2004 and the 6th District from 2004 to 2007, serving communities throughout West and Northwest Baltimore. As Council President, she chaired the City’s Board of Estimates, which supervises all purchasing by the City. From 1998 to 2006, Rawlings-Blake was an attorney with the Baltimore Office of the Public Defender.

Rawlings-Blake is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., Epsilon Omega Chapter and a former at-large member of the Alliance of Black Women Attorneys. Rawlings-Blake has been honored with numerous awards. She was selected by The Daily Record as one of “Maryland’s Top 100 Women” in 2007 and 2011. The National Congress of Black Women named her a Shirley Chisholm Memorial Award Trailblazer. The National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs named her one of Baltimore’s “Young Women on the Move.”

Mayor Rawlings-Blake has served on numerous boards and commissions, including the Baltimore Convention and Tourism Board; the Baltimore Museum of Art; the National Aquarium in Baltimore; Baltimore Substance Abuse Systems, Inc.; Living Classrooms Foundation; the Waterfront Partnership of Baltimore; and Parks and People Foundation.

Born on March 17, 1970, Rawlings-Blake is a 1988 graduate of Baltimore’s Western High School, and in 1992 she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio. She received her Juris Doctor from the University of Maryland School of Law in 1995. She is a member of the Federal Bar Association and the Maryland State Bar Association. Rawlings-Blake is a member of Douglas Memorial Community Church. She lives in Baltimore’s Coldspring neighborhood with her husband Kent Blake and their young daughter Sophia.

Bob manages Citi’s partnerships with global, national and local organizations to support community development through economic empowerment and financial inclusion, focusing on responsible and accessible finance, education and asset building; neighborhood preservation and revitalization; access to college education; and small business and microenterprise development. Bob also leads Citi’s commercial relationships with microfinance and other financial institutions, networks and investors ,working across Citi’s businesses and geographies, to expand access to financial services in underserved communities.

Since joining Citi, Bob has held a number of senior treasury, risk and corporate positions in Athens, Bahrain, Kenya, London and New York. He has served on many external boards and councils, including the Board of Advisors for the United Nations Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor. He currently is a member of the Policy Committee of the Centre for the Study of African Economies at the University of Oxford. He represents Citi on the Boards of the Microfinance Information Exchange, the Center for Financial Services Innovation (CSFI), the US FDIC Chairman’s Committee on Economic Empowerment, the Citi Foundation and the Executive Committee of CGAP (World Bank).

Bob completed his BA degrees in History and Political Science at Vassar College, in New York, and his Masters Degree in African Studies (History) at the University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies.

Jonathan Mintz, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs since Mayor Bloomberg appointed him to the post in 2006, leads the nation’s oldest and most powerful municipal consumer protection agency dedicated to empowering consumers and businesses to ensure a fair and vibrant marketplace. Regulating more than 78,000 businesses in 55 industries, Commissioner Mintz and his team have tackled large-scale enforcement and litigation initiatives focused on ending industrywide deceptive practices in the consumer marketplace. He launched the Department’s Office of Financial Empowerment, the country’s first local government initiative aimed expressly at educating, empowering, and protecting those with low incomes so they can  uild

assets and make the most of their financial resources. This unique approach to leveraging the powers and opportunities of municipal government in the field of asset building has been replicated in cities across the country through Mayor Bloomberg’s Cities for Financial Empowerment Coalition, founded and co-chaired by the Commissioner. The Commissioner’s years as an attorney, a law professor, and a Second grade teacher have contributed to his commitment to educating consumers and businesses about their rights and responsibilities in our complex marketplace.

Sarah Gerecke is Deputy Assistant Secretary for the new Office of Housing Counseling at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). She has also served as a senior policy advisor to the Assistant Secretary for Housing/FHA Commissioner. At HUD, her responsibilities include the launch of the Office of Housing Counseling mandated by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act, and initiatives to expand the availability of responsible credit so that families affected by the recent recession can improve their financial and housing conditions.

From 2009 to 2011, Sarah was Executive Director of the Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, a leading academic research center devoted to the public policy aspects of real estate, land use and housing development. Ms. Gerecke continues teach a graduate law and policy seminar at NYU in land use, housing and community development in New York City. She has written or edited several articles about affordable housing, housing finance and neighborhood change.

Until July 2009, Ms. Gerecke was Chief Executive Officer of Neighborhood Housing Services (NHS) of NYC, where she supervised lending, education, community development and real estate programs, assisting over 10,000 residents each year. Her 30-year career in affordable housing includes work housing homeless and special needs populations and positions in local government and the private sector. She is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

Timothy G. Massad was confirmed June 30, 2011 by the United States Senate to serve as the Department of the Treasury’s Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability. In this role, Massad is responsible for overseeing the implementation and wind down of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

Massad previously served as the Acting Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability. He joined Treasury in May 2009 as the Chief Counsel for the Office of Financial Stability (OFS). He also later became the Chief Reporting Officer for OFS.

Prior to joining Treasury, Massad was a partner with the law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP in New York. He had a diverse corporate practice, with an emphasis on corporate finance, international transactions and representation of some of the firm’s corporate clients. From 1998 to 2002, he was the co-manager of the firm’s Hong Kong office, where he was involved in transactions throughout Asia, including in particular India and China. He also worked in the firm’s London office.

Massad left Cravath from December 2008 to February 2009 to assist the newly formed Congressional Oversight Panel, one of the oversight agencies for TARP. He served as a special legal advisor to the COP for its first report on the TARP investments.

Massad received a B.A. from Harvard College and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He is married, has two children and lives in Washington, DC.

For nearly three decades Bill Bynum has worked to advance economic opportunity for disenfranchised and underserved populations. He currently serves as CEO of HOPE (Hope Enterprise Corporation/Hope Credit Union), a widely respected community development financial institution, intermediary and policy center that provides and promotes responsible financial services and related assistance for entrepreneurs, home-buyers and community development projects in distressed communities across Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. Previously, Bynum helped establish Self-Help, a pioneer in the development finance industry, and built nationally recognized programs at the North Carolina Rural Economic Development Center.

Bill currently serves as Vice Chairman of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Community Advisory Board. As chairman of the Treasury Department’s Community Development Advisory Board from 2002-2012 he advised Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama on community development, small business and financial service matters. A Salzburg Seminar Fellow and Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute, Bynum is a recipient of the University of North Carolina Distinguished Alumnus Award, Ernst & Young National Entrepreneur of the Year Award, National Rural Assembly Rural Hero Award and Inclusiv “Helping Hands” Award. His board/trustee service includes Millsaps College, Jackson State University Development Foundation, University of Mississippi MIND Center, Foundation for the Mid South, Mississippi Children’s Museum and the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation.

Cliff Rosenthal is Assistant Director of the Office of Financial Empowerment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. His office focuses on low-income and other economically vulnerable populations, including unbanked and underbanked consumers, people with no or thin credit files, and others without ready access to affordable credit and financial services. For more than 30 years, he worked for the Inclusiv, serving as its President and CEO until May 2012.

Mrs. Helen Godfrey Smith is President and Chief Executive Officer of Shreveport Federal Credit Union where she has served since 1983. She has grown the financial institution from less than 2-million in assets to nearly $100-million today. There are eight full service branches (five (5) across North Louisiana including a corporate office in the Shreveport “Auto Mall” and three in the Mississippi Delta).

Mrs. Smith truly believes in the Credit Union philosophy of “People Helping People.” She travels all over the country and to other countries helping other credit unions with counseling and strategic planning.

In 2012, Mrs. Helen Godfrey Smith was appointed to the Consumer Financial Protection Board’s (CFPB) Credit Union Advisory Council.

Mrs. Smith’s achievements and successes have landed her many awards and honors – the latest is the Credit Union Times National Credit Union Trailblazer Award. This is a national honor for her work in the community. She received the National Annie Vamper “Helping Hands” Award in Atlanta GA last year. In 2011, she was inducted into the Louisiana Credit Union League’s Hall of Fame. She traveled to Scotland in the UK to receive the I-CUDE (International Credit Union Development Educator) designation. In 2010, she received the highest credit union award from the African American Credit Union Coalition; other honors include: Citizen of the Year Award from the Shreveport/Bossier Concerned Citizens; 2009 Athena Award from the Women’s Council of the Shreveport Chamber of Commerce; Women of Excellence Award presented by the Louisiana Legislative Women’s Caucus and the list goes on.

Mrs. Smith is a huge advocate of higher education and wants all students to have the right to a good education which is why she is Chair of the Grambling University Foundation board and she holds a seat on the board of the Southern University Shreveport Foundation.

In addition, she sits on the board of the Shreveport Chamber of Commerce where this year she is Chair Elect of the Chamber. She is a member of the board of the North Caddo Hospital Foundation Board. She is a member of the Committee of 100; Women in Ministry International; Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority-Delta Lambda Omega Chapter.

Mrs. Helen Smith is the wife of entrepreneur Bobby Joe Smith, mother of one son, DeUndre and three beautiful granddaughters, Kierstal, DeAndrea Monique and Karlyn Helana and two grandsons, Julian Patrick and Kalep DeUndre.

Dan Smith is the CFPB’s first Assistant Director for the newly-created Office of Financial Institutions and Business Liaison. Mr. Smith comes to the CFPB having previously served as the Director for Industry and State Relations at Freddie Mac.

While at Freddie Mac, Mr. Smith served as the Director of Industry and State Relations and was responsible for legislative, regulatory, and industry issues in all 50 states. Mr. Smith managed Freddie Mac’s relationships with the National Association of Realtors (NAR), the minority realtor groups, and state realtor associations. Mr. Smith joined Freddie Mac having spent 15 years lobbying Governors, Attorneys General, State Agencies, and Legislative bodies in all 50 states on behalf of direct marketers and publishers, fortune 500 companies, international publishers, and three trade associations as Vice President at Dehart and Darr Associates.

Mr. Smith is a leading authority on state legislative process and has an in depth knowledge of consumer protection laws and regulations in the areas of foreclosure prevention, mortgage and banking related issues, privacy, direct marketing, and publishing.

Prior to working with state issues, Mr. Smith was a staff member in the Office of the Honorable Edward M. Kennedy in the United States Senate. Mr. Smith received his Masters of Business Administration and undergraduate degree in Political Science from Mount Saint Mary’s University.

Bill Cheney is president and CEO of Credit Union National Association (CUNA). He has broad experience within the credit union movement, having begun his career during 1987 in Texas (his home state) with Security Service FCU in San Antonio (today holding more than $5 billion in assets and 600,000 members).

Ten years later (in 1997), after achieving the position of executive vice president, Cheney was named president and CEO of Xerox FCU (today known as Xceed FCU) in El Segundo, Calif. During nine years at the helm of the credit union, Cheney guided the credit union’s growth to more than $800 million in assets (from $350 million), growing the credit union’s membership to include operations in nine states, including California, New York, Florida, Texas and Illinois.

Also while at XFCU, Cheney was elected to the board of directors of the National Association of Federal Credit Unions (NAFCU), a national trade group representing the interests of only federally chartered credit unions.

In 2006. the California/Nevada Credit Union Leagues tapped Cheney as their president and CEO. While overseeing the combined organizations’ operations, Cheney is credited with building the Leagues’ affiliation while improving their operational efficiencies.

Additionally, he has served as Treasurer of the American Association of Credit Union Leagues (AACUL), Chairman of the CUNA World Leadership Development Committee, member of the board of trustees of the Western CUNA Management School, member of the board of directors of the Richard Myles Johnson Foundation, and joined World Council of Credit Unions (WOCCU) delegations to Mexico, Poland, China, and Haiti.

Cheney holds a BBA (finance) from the University of Texas (Austin). He has attended the “Advanced Leadership Institute” at Harvard Business School (sponsored by the Credit Union Executive Society (CUES)/California Credit Union League (CCUL)), and the CUES Director’s Leadership Institute at the London Business School. He is a member of the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE).

An Eagle Scout, Cheney is a member of the National Eagle Scout Association and has been active in local Boy Scouts of America councils. He has served as a board member of the American Red Cross of Greater Los Angeles (and previously in San Antonio, Texas), volunteers with organizations such as Heal the Bay (Santa Monica, Calif.) and the Peninsula Education Foundation. He has also served as a guest lecturer at Pepperdine University.