Speakers

Nicole Boone has more than 14 years of experience in the banking, real estate and community development finance industry. At Lendistry, she is responsible for leading the capital strategy across all government program funding and other community capital products. Boone previously served as executive director, senior commercial banker within community development banking at JP Morgan Chase Bank, specializing in new markets tax credit (NMTC) equity. In her time there, she deployed more than $400 million in NMTC financing across nearly 40 deals. She also created and led the first-ever Community Development Banking Racial Equity Special Purpose Credit Program (SPCP) targeting Black Americans. SPCP resulted in the deployment of an additional $200 million of tax credit financing, across fifteen transactions supporting black businesses and nonprofits nationally. A graduate of Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University, Boone also serves on the board of directors at Excellent Education Development (ExED), the Local Advisory Council of LISC LA, and is on the executive leadership team at The Way Los Angeles.

Jonathan Katz is a partner in the Tax Practice Group. He focuses on federal taxation, with a particular concentration on federal and state new markets tax credit and historic rehabilitation tax credit transactions. In his tax credit practice, Jonathan represents institutional investors, project developers, lenders, community development entities (CDEs), and nonprofit organizations in connection with new markets tax credit, historic rehabilitation tax credit, and opportunity zone programs. He advises clients on projects that use a combination of various tax credits and other financing sources to fund industrial projects, operating businesses, mixed-use, commercial, and residential real estate developments, manufacturing facilities, and hotels. He also has significant experience financing public and quasi-public facilities with various state and federal tax incentives. Jonathan has represented investors, CDEs, and project developers in hundreds of federal and state new markets tax credit and historic rehabilitation tax credit transactions.

Elizabeth Feldmeir is a nationally known community development and tax credit advisor. For more than a decade, she has worked directly on several billion dollars in tax credit transactions and represents lenders, investors, community development entities and developers. She is recognized for her ability to collaborate with parties in a transaction and her understanding of her clients’ businesses and their priorities. With an advanced degree in tax law, Ms. Feldmeir draws on her knowledge to provide clients with comprehensive advice on the best approaches for structuring federal and state low-income housing tax credit, new markets tax credit and historic tax credits, as well as renewable tax credit transactions. Feldmeir combines traditional financing with tax incentives in order to finance the expansion of operating businesses and the development of mixed-use real estate, charter schools, manufacturing facilities, protective shelter facilities, hotels, theatres, health care facilities, and retail and commercial developments. She has also represents clients during the acquisition, development, construction, sale and management of commercial and multifamily residential property.

Harpreet Peleg is Chief Executive Officer of Building America CDE and also serves as Chief Financial Officer for the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust, a leader in impact investing.  Ms. Peleg has been an integral part of Building America’s operations since inception, having formerly served as its Chief Financial Officer. She has actively played a critical role in Building America’s successful allocation of $185 million in New Markets Tax Credits to 22 projects to-date.  As CEO, Ms. Peleg develops and implements overall strategy, generates investment opportunities, manages investor relations, and serves as the key liaison to the governing and advisory boards.

Olivia Barrow Strauss is the policy manager at the Low Income Investment Fund (LIIF) where she helps lead the organization’s strategic influence agenda. Barrow Strauss develops and advocates for public policies that increase access to capital and expand resources for affordable housing and community development projects. Prior to joining LIIF in 2019, Barrow Strauss worked as a senior policy analyst at Enterprise Community Partners and helped lead the organization’s affordable housing and community development tax credit advocacy efforts. Barrow Strauss received a bachelor’s degree in public policy and a master’s degree in public administration from The George Washington University.

James D. Howard is the president of Dudley Ventures. A native of The Bronx, New York, Howard earned his degree from The College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, and a law degree from Georgetown University Law Center. Dudley Ventures was founded by Howard in 1996 and has been one of the leading advocates of the New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) program since its inception. Dudley Ventures, with its 25-plus member team, successfully manages NMTC investment funds in excess of $1.6 billion, providing all origination, fund reporting and compliance activities in-house. In addition, Dudley Ventures CDE, DV Community Investment, has been awarded $525 million of NMTC allocation to date. Acquired by Valley National Bancorp in October 2021, Dudley Ventures now has the resources of a $50 billion publicly traded financial institution. Howard is a board member of the New Markets Tax Credit Coalition and has been an innovator in the NMTC industry. Howard has authored numerous articles on tax credit investing and is a regular speaker at major NMTC conferences. Howard is a licensed member of the Arizona State Bar and holds the FINRA designation of principal and investment banker.

Jake Kaplan is a senior associate with Alston & Bird’s wealth planning and exempt organizations group. He focuses his practice in the areas of estate planning, exempt organizations, new markets tax credit (NMTC) financings, health care restructurings, mergers and acquisitions, and federal taxation. Kaplan draws on his rich and varied experiences to benefit a diverse group of clients whose needs often overlap across his areas of expertise. He advises individuals, families, and fiduciaries on tax issues, estate planning strategies, philanthropic plans, and estate administration procedures and best practices. Kaplan counsels exempt organizations on myriad specialized tax, governance, formation, and operational issues. He represents hospitals, schools, other exempt organizations, and community development entities in federal NMTC financings that help non-profits fund important real estate redevelopment projects. He also counsels health care clients on a range of tax and governance issues, with significant experience designing and implementing organizational structures for such clients in M&A transactions and internal restructurings. Kaplan has been listed twice in “Ones to Watch” by The Best Lawyers in America© for Trusts & Estates Law and twice as an “Associate to Watch” by Chambers HNW in Private Wealth Law. He frequently speaks on industry topics and issues at national conferences for organizations such as Novogradac. Kaplan earned his juris doctor and master’s degree from Emory University, where he was elected to the Order of the Coif and served on the executive board of the Emory Bankruptcy Developments Journal.

Michael Novogradac is the managing partner of Novogradac, which has been in business since 1989. He specializes in affordable housing, community development, historic preservation and renewable energy. Mr. Novogradac’s focus is in real estate taxation and accounting. He is the author of numerous real estate-related tax and accounting articles and books, including the Novogradac Opportunity Zones Handbook, the New Markets Tax Credit Handbook and the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Handbook. A frequent speaker at tax incentive conferences and forums throughout the country, Mr. Novogradac also broadcasts a weekly podcast, Tax Credit Tuesday. As a leading industry expert, he is frequently quoted in national media, such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Politico, Bloomberg, Forbes, CNBC News, NBC News, National Public Radio and Crain’s New York Business.  Mr. Novogradac is active in advocating for the inclusion of affordable housing, historic preservation, community development and renewable energy incentives in federal and state tax policy, and serves as advisor on industry and governmental affairs for the NMTC Working Group, LIHTC Working Group and the Opportunity Zones Working Group. Mr. Novogradac provides input to the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Internal Revenue Service, Community Development Financial Institutions Fund, and other federal and state agencies as well as members of Congress, including testimony before the United States House Committee on Ways and Means. Mr. Novogradac also serves on the executive committee of the Housing Advisory Group and the boards of directors of the Affordable Housing Tax Credit Coalition, the National Housing Conference, the NMTC Coalition and Historic Tax Credit Coalition. In 2016, Mr. Novogradac was inducted into the Affordable Housing Hall of Fame. He also received The Affordable Housing Visionary Award from The NHP Foundation in 2018, in recognition of his contributions to the affordable housing community and in 2020 was honored as one of the top 25 OZ Influencers through Opportunity Zone Magazine. Mr. Novogradac graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles, with a bachelor’s degree in economics. He received an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley. He is licensed in California, Oregon, Maryland and Texas as a certified public accountant. You can follow Mr. Novogradac on twitter @novogradac and on his blog at www.novoco.com/blog or listen to his weekly podcast at www.novoco.com/podcast.

Chimeka Gladney is a senior vice president for new markets tax credits (NMTCs) at Truist Community Capital where she is responsible for the origination and closing of NMTC investments in several states. Prior to joining Truist, Gladney led the NMTC team at Enterprise Community Investments, whose NMTC portfolio includes more than $1 billion of investments in commercial, mixed-use and community facilities. Before joining Enterprise, Gladney was director of project management with U.S. Bank’s Community Development Corporation. There she led a 17-member team that structured, underwrote and closed more than $750 million in federal and state NMTC and historic tax credit investments annually. Gladney’s community development experience also includes planning and economic development work with the District of Columbia government and municipal bond finance at several investment banks. She holds bachelor’s degree from Howard University and an MBA from Stanford University.

Saurabh Narain is president and CEO of National Community Investment Fund (NCIF), an impact investor and CDFI focused on mission-oriented financial institutions including minority and CDFI banks. He is a banking executive with almost 35 years of global experience building highly profitable businesses both in the for-profit and nonprofit environments. Under his leadership, NCIF has increased its AUM to $200 million, created more than 10,000 jobs and is the largest investor in CDFI and minority banks. NCIF seeks to generate impact in underserved markets nationally using its three lines of businesses–equity investing into mission-oriented financial institutions, deployment of new markets tax credits and lending.  In 2019, NCIF launched a $35 million credit strategies fund to increase co-lending with its network banks.Impact measurement is foundational to all activities of NCIF. Narainis a member of the investors council of the Global Impact Investing Network, the board of the CDFI Coalition, advisory board of Wells Fargo Community Development Entity and Community Development Venture Capital Alliance. He was a past member of the Federal Reserve Board’s Consumer Advisory Council chaired by Chairman Ben Bernanke and advisory board of Ripple. Prior to NCIF, Narain has had extensive experience in capital markets and risk management having worked at Bank of America for almost 17 years based in Asia and the United States. Narain is a graduate of the ABA Graduate Stonier School of Banking, and hold an MBA from Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad, India.