Nalani Fujimori Kaina

President

Hawaii

Nalani Fujimori Kaina is the executive director of the Legal Aid Society of Hawaii, Hawaii’s oldest and largest statewide nonprofit organization providing free civil legal services to the poor. Ms. Kaina joined Legal Aid in 1999 as a staff attorney on the island of Moloka`i. She is a commissioner on the Access to Justice Commission, a past president and current director of Hawaii Women Lawyers, a member of the ACLU of Hawaii’s Litigation Committee, and the chair of the Hawaii State Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. Previously, she sat on the boards of the Maui County Bar Association, Molokai Occupational Center and Hale Ho´okipa, an outpatient substance abuse treatment center on Molokai.

Ms. Kaina received the 2013 Ho´okele Award from the Hawaii Community Foundation, 2011 Rhoda Lewis Award from the Hawaii Women’s Legal Foundation and the 2008 Hawaii State Bar Association’s C. Fredrick Schutte Award. She was also a 2014 Pacific Business News American Savings Bank Business Leader of the Year finalist. Ms. Kaina graduated from New York University School of Law and received her bachelor’s degree from Macalester College, St. Paul, Minnesota.

Vickie K. Oldman

Vice President

New Mexico

Vickie specializes in culturally relevant approaches to organizational development. She has more than 20 years of expertise in strategic planning, board development, leadership training, team building, asset building and executive coaching to Native and rural communities. Vickie has been a lead trainer, technical assistance provider and executive coach in various capacity building initiatives funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s CDFI Fund, including YouthBuild USA, NeighborWorks® America, Corporation for Enterprise Development and the Native American Indian Housing Council. Vickie has a Master of Social Work with a concentration in Community Planning and Administration from New Mexico Highlands University. She also holds a Bachelor of Social Work from Arizona State University. She is an enrolled member of the Navajo tribe, and her clans are Black Streak of the Forest People, Mud People, One Who Walks Around People, and Folding Arm People.

Frank Bravo

Secretary

California

Frank Bravo is the community lending officer for First Republic Bank. He has more than 20 years of banking experience, which includes an in-depth understanding of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), multifamily mortgage revenue bonds and Low Income Housing Tax Credit programs. He also has more than 16 years of experience in community and affordable housing development, economic development and financing. During the past nine years, Mr. Bravo has focused on bringing financial resources to rural communities of California, specifically farm worker housing and infrastructure finance. Mr. Bravo’s most recent assignment calls for the development and implementation of a community lending strategy for First Republic Bank’s bicoastal markets. Mr. Bravo currently serves on the boards of the Kings County Management & Development Corporation and the California Community Reinvestment Corporation. He has a bachelor’s degree in biological science from University of California, Davis.

Marty Miller

Treasurer

Washington

Marty Miller is the executive director of the Yakima-based Office of Rural and Farmworker Housing (ORFH), a nonprofit housing developer and Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) serving rural Washington. He has more than 20 years of affordable housing development experience. Mr. Miller also is active in advocacy and serves on several boards including the National Rural Housing Coalition and the National Farmworker Housing Directors Association. He has a master’s degree in economic development from Eastern University in Pennsylvania.

Megan Alvanna Stimpfle

Board Member

Alaska

Megan Alvanna Stimpfle is the principal strategist of Arctic Geopolitical Consulting, a firm based in Nome, Alaska focused on infrastructure development in rural Alaska Native communities. She also serves as a self-governance liaison for Norton Sound Health Corporation, working with community and executive leadership on establishing a pathway to service for the five communities in the Bering Strait region that are unconnected to sewer and water. She has served as chief of her tribe, the King Island Native Community, and is a former commissioner of the Nome Port Commission helping to advance the development of a deep draft port in Nome. She served as a legislative assistant for Sen. Lisa Murkowski in Washington D.C. responsible for policies addressing infrastructure and sanitation, housing, health delivery, public safety and justice, land management, and fish and wildlife management for Alaska Natives and rural Alaskans. She was the lead staffer in establishing the Senate Arctic Caucus. She assisted in organizing the Arctic Imperative Summits in Girdwood, Alaska to bring arctic and coastal Alaskan issues to the forefront of American policy. She was involved in the historic 2010 election of Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Sen. Dan Sullivan. Megan was born and raised in Nome and takes pride in Eskimo dancing and learning her Inupiaq language. She holds a master’s degree in applied economics from Johns Hopkins University and a bachelor’s degree in economics from George Mason University.

Nancy Brown

Board Member

Nevada

Nancy Brown is the managing director for community development for Charles Schwab Bank. She is responsible for grants and services in California and Nevada. Ms. Brown has more than 39 years of banking experience and has been with Charles Schwab Bank for the past 16 years. She started her career at Schwab in 2003 when the bank opened its headquarters in Reno, Nevada. Ms. Brown holds an associate degree from the Merced Community College, she has attended CBA Graduate School Retail Banking, FRB Community Development Lending School, and Bay Area Ross Program in Real Estate.

She manages and plans the bank’s Community Reinvestment Act grants, services and business outreach activities; establishes and implements programs and activities; and maintains relationships with banking partners, community based, charitable and nonprofit organizations.

Richard Elías

Board Member

Arizona

Richard Elías has represented District Five on the Pima County Board of Supervisors since February 2002. He works for and is a vocal advocate for affordable housing, eliminating health-care disparities, nurturing youth development and providing quality education in the Sonoran Desert. He works to protect the desert region’s precious water supplies and shrinking wildlife habitat; to diversify and improve the desert’s housing stock and repair and reinvest in its aging urban infrastructure. He works to make Pima County more hospitable and prosperous, a better place for people to work and play. He seeks to bring everyone together in a spirit of community cooperation to enhance their quality of life. Mr. Elías entered public office after a lengthy career in government and nonprofit affordable housing development.

A fifth-generation Tucsonan, Mr. Elías is the son of a longtime local union printer, and was a union shop steward with Retail Clerk’s Union Local 727 (now United Food and Commercial Workers Local 99) when he worked in the grocery industry before completing college. He holds a bachelor’s degree in history, with a minor in Mexican-American studies, from the University of Arizona.

Carleen Herring

Board Member

Idaho

Carleen Herring is the U.S. Economic Development Administration’s representative for Idaho and Nevada.  Prior to joining EDA, Ms. Herring spent more than 33 years working for Region IV Development Association, a nonprofit economic development organization located in Twin Falls, Idaho. At the Association, she focused her rural community development career on infrastructure finance and small business lending. Retiring in 2019 as the Association’s president, today, Ms. Herring continues to support rural constituencies by working on issues that impact sustainability across Idaho and Nevada.

Ms. Herring holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and business administration from Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois.

Lyle Meeks

Board Member

Montana

Lyle Meeks is an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Tribe and a Blackfeet Indian Reservation native. He is a licensed professional engineer with 40 years of experience in development and rehabilitation of public drinking water and wastewater facilities as well as commercial, recreational and industrial projects. Mr. Meeks is past chairman of the Montana Section of the American Water Works Association and received the George Warren Fuller Award given by that organization for constructive leadership in the Montana drinking water industry. Mr. Meeks was utilities manager for water, wastewater, and storm drain systems in Great Falls, Montana. He holds a civil engineering degree from Montana State University.

Claudia O’Grady

Board Member

Utah

Claudia O’Grady has been involved in community development, and particularly affordable housing solutions, for more than 22 years. She began her career working for a Utah-based nonprofit developer of affordable multifamily housing, where she served as the executive director for more than a decade. The organization focused on small project development in rural communities throughout Utah. Later she joined Homestead Capital, a regional syndicator of Low Income Housing Tax Credits, where she developed investor relationships and placed equity investments in tax credit housing throughout the Intermountain West. Since 2009, Claudia has served as the vice president, multifamily financing, for Utah Housing Corporation, the state housing finance agency. She oversees the state’s housing credit program and multifamily lending programs. Ms. O’Grady also serves on the Salt Lake City Redevelopment Advisory Commission where she helps create redevelopment strategies in blight areas. She holds a bachelor’s degree in government from Harvard University.

Kim Peone

Board Member

Washington

Kimberly Peone is the chief corporate-financial officer for the Colville Tribal Federal Corporation. Prior to becoming the CCFO, Ms. Peone served on the corporation’s board for three years. Today, she is both chief executive officer and chief financial officer for 12 Enterprises.

Previously, she was the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians’ deputy financial officer. She was responsible for the Tribal government’s overall financial affairs, including an annual operating and capital budget in excess of $375 million. Ms. Peone has held a wide variety of financial positions during her career in Tribal government service. She has served the Spokane Tribe of Indians, Kalispel Tribe of Indians, Colville Confederated Tribes, Coeur d’Alene Tribe of Indians, Shoshone-Bannock Tribes and the Yakima Nation among others.

Ms. Peone has built Tribal infrastructures to support financial progress. Her strong leadership and understanding of Tribal financial systems has brought much success to the organizations she served. Her extensive Tribal government experience has helped her to understand Tribal organizations’ complexity. She thinks strategically and communicates complex issues in a simple and straightforward manner to help Tribes progress and change. Her operational experience has helped her adapt to change and work through adversity.

Ms. Peone holds two bachelor’s degrees in business administration, professional accounting and marketing.

John Sheehan

Board Member

California

John Sheehan retired in 2012 as executive director of Plumas Corporation, a nonprofit focusing on economic and business development, visitor attraction and conservation of natural resources in Plumas County. He has more than 40 years of community development experience working with nonprofits and various government agencies. He is currently president of the Trustees at Feather River Community College and serves on the Feather River Stewardship Coalition and Plumas County Coordination (intergovernmental) boards. Mr. Sheehan also served on the boards of the California Coalition for Rural Housing and California Rural Development Council.