HousingWorks Board of Directors

Francie Ferguson — President
Frances Ferguson has served as the Director of the NeighborWorks® Multifamily Initiative for NeighborWorks America since 1998. NeighborWorks America is a federally chartered non-profit corporation which works with a network of 235 locally based community development corporations throughout the country. Launched in 1999, the Multifamily Initiative serves 90+ member organizations with asset management, development, and resident services resources. From 1986-1998 she served as the founding executive director of Foundation Communities, acquiring and managing over 1250 units of affordable, service-enhanced apartment and duplex housing in the Austin and Dallas-Ft.Worth communities. During her tenure at Foundation Communities, she was a founding board member of the Alamo Area Mutual Housing Association and of the Texas Association of CDCs. Francie holds her masters in business (concentration in real estate and finance) from the University of Texas at Austin, and her bachelor's degree from Oberlin College.

Karen Paup — Vice President
Karen Paup is Co-Director of the Texas Low Income Housing Information Service, the state's foremost low-income housing advocacy and policy organization. Karen has been working in the housing field for over twenty-five years. She holds a BA in Liberal Arts from UT-Austin and a MA in Urban Affairs from the University of Delaware. Working with grass roots leaders from inner city communities to the colonias of South Texas, Karen helps local residents realize their own visions for their communities. Her work has resulted in: neighborhood-controlled organizations building the first new houses in their areas in five decades; Austin's only neighborhood-operated housing for the homeless; home-ownership for low-wage workers; and community-based housing for the elderly. She serves as vice chair of the City of Austin's Community Development Commission.

Clint Smith — Treasurer
Clint Smith is very active in the East Austin community, advocating on behalf of lower income folks to address their neighborhood issues and concerns. He has served on numerous nonprofit Boards and community taskforces, including Family Eldercare, Community Action Network, CenTex ACLU, City of Austin Public Safety Task Force, Gray Panthers of Austin, and the Texas Senior Advocacy Coalition, to name a few. Clint has a diverse professional background, having worked for over 20 years at the US Civil Service Commission in DC and served for several years as a housing manager for the San Antonio Housing Authority. Clint holds a BA degree from Lincoln University and attended graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania.

Catherine Echols — Secretary
Catharine Echols is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Texas. After obtaining a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois, she conducted research at Stanford University before joining the UT faculty in 1990. A longtime leader on neighborhood issues, Echols helped to establish Hyde Park's Neighborhood Conservation Combining District and the successful Triangle redevelopment project. She has served on Community Advisory Groups for Corridor Planning and Capitol Metro, and on the Community Bond Oversight Committee for AISD, and currently serves on the Commercial Design Standards Taskforce.

Ashton Cumberbatch
Ashton Cumberbatch, Jr. is currently Vice President, Advocacy and Community Relations, with Seton Healthcare Network where he is responsible for developing and implementing strategies to build, maintain and leverage effective internal and external constituency relationships. He is a board member of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce, KLRU, Central Texas Regional Visioning project. He has served as a co-chair of the 5-year plan curriculum committee for Austin Independent School District. Ashton is a speaker and author of several articles on employment law and employee relations. Ashton holds a B.A in economics from Brown University and a J.D. from the University of Texas School of Law.

Frank Fernandez
Frank serves as Executive Director of Community Partnership for the Homeless, a non-profit organization that provides housing for homeless individuals and families. Prior to joining Community Partnership, Frank served as Deputy Director for Peoplefund, a community development financial institution focused on promoting economic vitality and opportunity in lower income communities in Central Texas. Frank holds a B.A. in Philosophy from Harvard University and an M.P.A. from the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. Frank has been active with several non-profit boards and task forces, including serving as the Campaign Chair of the HousingWorks Action Affordable Housing Bond Election campaign, Chair of the City of Austin's Affordable Housing Incentives Taskforce, Board President of the Alliance for Public Transportation, and as Board Treasurer for FamilyConnections, to name a few.

Gus Garcia
Gus has served the Austin community through various public offices for well over 30 years. Most recently, he served as Mayor of Austin from November 2001 to June 2003. Prior to that, he served as a City of Austin Council Member for over 9 years. He also has served on the Board of Trustees of the Austin Independent School District and the Austin Community College. Gus is a certified CPA who practiced for over 30 years. He has three children and five grandchildren and continues to enjoy serving the people of Austin. Gus holds a BA from the University of Texas at Austin.

Johnny Limon
Johnny worked for Tracor, Inc. for over 30 years and retired in 1998. He is one of eleven children, and currently takes care of his 93 year-old mother. Johnny's community involvement started in 1980 when he began building relationships with neighborhood youth to keep them away from gangs. Later, he became a Big Brother with Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Austin for 7 years has served as Choir Director at St. Julia Catholic Church for twenty years. In 1990, Johnny became President of the newly formed Gardens Neighborhood Association, to improve the environment in East Austin. He serves on numerous non-profit Boards, including Family Eldercare, Lyons Gardens Senior Citizen Housing, and Rosewood Senior Housing Community. Working in his community, especially with the elderly, has helped him put a face(s) on the need for affordable housing. Johnny believes fundamentally that our elderly parents, relatives, and friends should be able to live in a place they call home.

John McKinnerney
John is a partner with Simmons Vedder & Company, a national real estate development firm. He has initiated the development and acquisition of numerous commercial and multifamily properties in the southeast and southwest United States. John is an active member of the Urban Land Institute and serves as the Austin District Council Chair. He is a member of the Advisory Committee for the National Multi Housing Council and he is an Advisory Member for the University of Texas' Center for Real Estate Finance. John also is a past member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Real Estate Council of Austin. John received his BA from the University of Texas at Austin.

Terry Mitchell
Terry Mitchell is a Principal with Momark Development L.L.C., Austin, Texas. As a Principal, he is involved in the planning and development of various residential and mixed-use real estate developments. Terry's focus is to develop quality, desirable communities that improve through the years, and his philosophy of development is that each community is unique and must be planned within the context of the neighborhood in which it exists. The community must enhance the overall area and achieve the objectives of the governing City, and creating a long-term relationship with every stakeholder involved in a project builds collaboration among the stakeholders will result in a better project for the community.

Terry Mitchell is the 2006 Past President, Real Estate Council of Austin (RECA). He has served on the Executive Committee and Board member of RECA for 12 years, Board of Hill Country Conservancy, Advisory Board of Trust for Public Land, Chairman of CAN Affordable Housing Task Force (1999), Barton Springs Advisory Committee (2007), and Water Conservation Citizen's Committee (2007).

Thuy Phan
Thuy runs his own real estate investment firm, Renew RE, LP, that provides market rate housing in the Austin area. Prior to forming this company, Thuy worked in the IT industry for several years for IBM, Equator Technologies Inc, and Infotronic America. He also is very active in the Vietnamese community. Thuy created the community service center at the Vietnamese Martyr Catholic Church to help fill out applications, look for jobs, look for affordable and/or assisted living, and subsidized medical insurance programs. He's involved with the Vietnamese American Community of Austin, Texas (VACAT), Vietnamese American Heritage Foundation (VAHF), and the Network of Asian American Organizations (NAAO). Thuy received his BS in Computer Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin.

Kathy Tyler
Kathy Tyler has over 30 years experience in housing development and housing finance. As director of a three-state housing program for MET Inc., she leads efforts along the Texas border and parts of Louisiana that have resulted in 200 improved farmworker-occupied units, development of 100 multi-family units, and in Minnesota, $500K in assistance to the rural homeless. Kathy spent 15 years working at the national level with McAuley Institute, providing training, financial help, and capacity-building assistance, with a focus on women's leadership and housing, to over 250 nonprofit developers located around the country. She was a founder of the Texas Low Income Housing & Information Service and the Texas Development Institute. Locally she serves on the boards of the Foundation for Expanding Horizons and the Austin Gray Panthers. Past leadership roles include chairing the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta's Affordable Housing Advisory Committee, the Coalition for Low Income Community Development, and Austin?s Community Development Commission. Kathy received a BA and a Masters in Social Work from the University of Texas at Austin.