Annetta Jenkins
Senior Program Director
561-471-7700 Ext:18
ajenkins@liscnet.org
Annetta Jenkins, Senior Program Director, Local Initiatives Support Corporation (South Florida), has over twenty five years experience in real estate finance, planning, law, management and community development. She leads a team of other professionals, AmeriCorps members and several project, financial and management consultants. Prior to joining LISC, Ms. Jenkins was the Associate Director of a lending consortium of sixteen banks, formerly an attorney in private practice, and an economic development planner with a Florida regional planning authority.

Annetta has a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics (magna cum laude) and a Juris Doctor degree in law. She has numerous certificates in real estate, real estate finance, business planning, organizational development, homeownership education, credit counseling, marketing and leadership. She also has an Executive Certificate from the Columbia University Business School’s Institute for Nonprofit Management.

At LISC, Annetta is primarily responsible for external relations, strategic planning, fundraising, directing the various programs and initiatives that support and assist a number of CDCs and other nonprofits, and managing a sophisticated public policy agenda. In her nine years at LISC she has led a resurgence in LISC activity that has resulted in a total leveraged investment in Palm Beach and Broward and now Miami-Dade counties in excess of $400 million. The total South Florida LISC portfolio exceeds $700 million. She developed the Signature Projects Portfolio, a pipeline of comprehensive, mixed use projects.

While at the Community Financing Consortium, Inc., now an eleven-bank lending consortium based in West Palm Beach, Annetta managed the residential lending and small commercial development business lines. She served as principal grantswriter. Annetta managed the groundbreaking “Restoring Our Neighborhoods I & II” Programs, the “Restoring Boynton’s Neighborhoods” Program, and was the principal trainer in the homebuyer education program for her tenure there. When she left in early 1996, the Consortium’s portfolio exceeded $50 million.

At LISC, Annetta oversees the program development for 35 CDCs, numerous partnerships, and seventeen key comprehensive community initiatives. She is a Board Member of the Florida Housing Coalition; a member of the Palm Beach County Workforce/Attainable Housing Taskforce, a member of the Fannie Mae South Florida Advisory Council; past Chairperson of the county-wide Affordable Housing Collaborative; past Co-chair of Partnership for Neighborhood Initiatives; is a founding board member and current Chairperson of the Community Alliance for Reform in Education, (CARE), a county-wide education advocacy organization; and is on the Steering Committee for Palm Beach County Weed & Seed, a program of the U.S. Department of Justice. Additionally, Annetta has membership in the Association of Fundraising Professionals. Annetta is also a founding member of the Governor’s Revitalization Council for the Front Porch Florida Initiative in the Northwood/Pleasant City/Northwest neighborhoods of West Palm Beach. She is a graduate of Leadership Florida Class XXII.

She has a teenage son, a daughter in her fourth year of medical school, and twin grandchildren.

Lynda Charles
Senior Program Officer and Chief Underwriter
561-471-7700 Ext 4027
lcharles@liscnet.org
Lynda Charles is a Senior Program Officer and Chief Underwriter with South Florida LISC since 1997. Ms. Charles is responsible for managing the Capacity Building Initiative, which consists of the following elements: the coordination of activities of the Community Development Training Institute (CDTI), the management of the LISC-AmeriCorps Program, and proposal development for CDCs in her portfolio. She provides technical assistance to LISC-assisted CDCs in the areas of marketing, program management, project development and financing.

Prior to joining Palm Beach County LISC, Lynda worked as a planner for Palm Beach County Commission on Affordable Housing. She was responsible for implementing the State Housing Initiatives Program (SHIP) second mortgage assistance program. She also worked as a research specialist in an appraisal firm in Miami.

Lynda has an M.A. in Urban and Regional Planning and a B.A in Economics. Additional training include: Financial Management for Non-Profit Organizations; Single Family Housing Development Finance and Homebuyer Education Methods “Train the Trainer”. Lynda recently completed The Institute for Not-for-Profit Management Middle Management Program, Graduate School of Business at Columbia University.

Mary Ellen Gore
Senior Development Officer
megore@lisc.org
Mary Ellen Gore is the Senior Development Officer with South Florida LISC since 2005. She is responsible for external affairs—resource development, policy, marketing and communications South Florida region. She is responsible for working with the South Florida program staff and Regional Advisory Board to devise and implementing fundraising strategies for specific initiatives.

Prior to joining South Florida LISC, Mary Ellen worked in marketing and communications in the private and non-profit sectors.

Mary Ellen has a M.A. and B.A. in History from the University of South Florida.

Kristopher Smith
Senior Program Office
ksmith@lisc.org
Kristopher Smith, Senior Program Officer has been with LISC since 2005. He has over 10 years of community building experience in the non profit, government and educational sectors. He is currently leading community revitalization program in the City of Miami neighborhood of Overtown focusing on affordable housing, community safety, and small business support and leadership development. Prior to joining LISC, he worked as an Administrator for the City of Miami Overtown Neighborhood Enhancement Team (NET). At the City of Miami, he facilitated an improvement in the execution of city-led response to resident concerns which resulted in a cleaner, safer and greener community.

He has a Master’s in Public Administration and Bachelor’s in Political Science. He has served on numerous community boards including the Downtown Community Development CDC, Jefferson Reeves Sr. Health Clinic and (as co-chair) of the National Black Child Development Institute, South Florida chapter. Mr. Smith is a professional grant reviewer and has served on review teams with: Department of Education, Langcloth Foundation and Dade Community Foundation (Miamians Working Together).

Rosa Talero
Program Officer
rtalero@lisc.org
Rosa Talero is a Program Officer and started with LISC in 2005. She is responsible for managing lending relationships with local Community Development Corporations, government and for profit developers. Ms. Talero has over 20 years of experience in the areas of community economic development and not-for-profit financial management.

Rosa has developed CRA and economic development programs targeted to small businesses and first time homebuyers and provided direct technical assistance and classroom training to new entrepreneurs. She worked as Director of Finance for two non-profit organizations in Boston, and has been Board Treasurer of several organizations for many years. She holds a degree in economics and an MBA from the University of Massachusetts.