Speaker Biographies

Carmen M. Maldonado

Community Development Officer, New York City Local Initiatives Support Corporation

Carmen Maldonado is a Community Development Officer for the New York City Local Initiatives Support Corporation. In this position she manages a portfolio of community development corporations (CDCs) located in the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Harlem.

Her role is to provide CDCs with technical assistance in organizational development and deal development. She also works to develop city-wide strategies addressing community needs and collaborates with municipal and private sectors to implement development programs. To date, she is responsible for commitments exceeding over $600,000 in grants, $14 million in loans and lines of credit, and $19 million in equity.

Having managed the NYC LISC Education Facilities Venture Seed Fund since 1999 – supporting CDCs and alternative public schools during the feasibility stage of development – she is now working to establish the first New York City based Education Facilities Loan Fund. She has also managed the Safe At Home Program – partnering two CDCs with their local police precincts in the South Bronx and Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhoods to intensely address quality of life and crime issues.

Ms. Maldonado’s current work is an extension of her overall dedication to revitalizing disenfranchised communities. Prior to joining LISC she was a school teacher in the School District of Philadelphia working in North and West Philadelphia where she taught at the elementary and middle school levels. While in Philadelphia, she also co-founded the Latino Leadership Institute, Inc. and designed a leadership program introducing Latino college students to careers in their communities.

Ms. Maldonado received her B.A. in Communications Theory and Master’s in Elementary Education from the University of Pennsylvania. Her focus on urban education led her to be a three-time conference presenter at the Annual National Conference on Urban Education for the Center for Urban Education in Philadelphia. Carmen also received a Master’s in Public Administration from Baruch College, City University of New York. She is a National Urban/Rural Fellow through which she was first exposed to the world of community development.

Carmen was born and raised in the Soundview section of the Bronx and is delighted to be able to support the revitalization of NYC communities through community development.