Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Laura Porter is a managing director in Fitch�s public finance department, where she heads the States Ratings Group and is a member of the department�s executive and criteria committees.� Laura joined Fitch in 2005 and is based in New York City.�Laura�s previous public finance experience includes work in investment banking.� She was a vice president in the tax-exempt securities division at Morgan Stanley.� In addition, she has held senior administrative positions at New York City based not-for-profit institutions.�Laura earned a master�s degree in public and private management at the Yale School of Management, and a bachelor�s degree in economics at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.� In addition, she is a member of the Municipal Analysts Group of New York.

Bob O’Brien is Senior Vice President heading Amalgamated Bank’s newly created Public Finance Division with an emphasis on lending to distressed municipalities as well as to those municipalities faced with diminished financing options. Established in 1923 by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America and now owned by its successor organization, Workers United, Amalgamated Bank is the largest union-owned bank in the United States. Amalgamated’s financing efforts in the distressed municipal space are designed to provide municipalities with breathing space while its leaders work through a recovery plan. Our view is that reducing a municipality’s immediate liquidity stress is an important step in potentially improving outcomes for local residents, municipal workers, and the community itself – a message consistent with Amalgamated’s history of being the bank of working families and local communities.Before joining Amalgamated, O’Brien started and headed the public finance group at LBBW, Germany’s fifth-largest bank, and he also led the municipal finance credit underwriting efforts of BluePoint Re, a start-up bond reinsurer owned by Wachovia.O’Brien’s experience includes time at Fitch Ratings where he analyzed local municipal issuers and rated municipal structured transactions. He earned an MPA from Columbia University and a BA from the University of Pennsylvania.

Christine C. Quinn has spent her career in public service, fighting for policies and services that are critical to the lives of New Yorkers. Chris started out as a housing organizer, helping low-income tenants stay in their homes and protecting affordable housing. As the director of the Gay & Lesbian Anti-Violence Project, Chris worked closely with the NYPD against hate crimes.Since 1999, Chris has served Manhattan’s lower west side in the City Council. Elected Speaker in 2006, Chris has negotiated on-time, balanced City budgets, reducing government spending, and preventing firehouse closings, teacher layoffs and cuts to key services.Quinn has worked to find innovative and fiscally responsible ways to spark job creation. She has been a leader in the fight to eliminate unfair taxes, particularly the double taxation of freelancers and sole proprietors. She has fought to eliminate unnecessary regulation on small businesses, and created a program that has drastically reduced the average wait for government inspections for new businesses. She has worked to diversify our economy, investing in growing job sectors like health care and food manufacturing. And Chris has helped our City develop an economy of innovation through tax credits and initiatives to support new ventures in the five boroughs.A longtime advocate for affordable housing, Quinn renewed incentives for developers who build affordable units. Protecting tenants is a top priority – Speaker Quinn passed legislation to allow landlords to be taken to court for threatening tenants or interrupting essential services, as well as forcing landlords to repair dangerous apartments. Her innovative Housing Asset Renewal Program has turned unsold condominiums into affordable middle-income housing.Speaker Quinn has long advocated investment in early childhood education and has worked to expand the City’s universal Pre-Kindergarten program. She has also worked extensively to better our middle schools, and at her urging the Department of Education has funded innovative new programs at the highest-need middle schools in the city.Quinn and the Council led the environmental movement with legislation, the first of its kind in the nation, requiring manufacturers to collect and recycle electronic waste, and passed a bill establishing a plastic bag recycling program. And Quinn has passed bills to improve energy efficiency in large commercial buildings – a move that will reduce the city's carbon footprint.

Laure is currently the Director of Economic Development and Intergovernmental Affairs for the City of Stamford. Prior to coming to Stamford Laure has worked primarily in the private sector. She began her career at W. R. Grace where she was the assistant to the Chairman, J. Peter Grace; the Director of Business Development for Grace’s Southeast Asia Industrial Chemical Group, where she was based in Hong Kong and Vice President of International for Baker & Taylor, Grace’s book wholesale division. She spent 4 years at Ernst & Young as part of the business development group. Her other public sector experience was directly following 9/11 where she joined the Bloomberg administration as head of International Business Development for New York City at the New York City Economic Development Corporation.Laure is a graduate of Smith College, received a Masters in Psychology from Boston College and her MBA from Harvard University.

Over the course of more than two decades in public service to New York, the nation and the Latino community, Adolfo Carrión, Jr. has earned a reputation for bringing innovation and common sense solutions to government.Carrión began his career of service as a youth pastor and New York City public school teacher, where he gained a thorough understanding of the needs of students and their parents. Compelled to make positive impacts on these students’ total environment, Carrión pursued a career in urban planning. He became a City Planner and later served as the District Manager of Community Board 5 in the Bronx before winning a seat on the New York City Council in 1997.During his time on the City Council, Carrión was an outspoken proponent of education reform and worked to ensure minority communities’ participation in the 2000 census. He was the first freshman council member in history to be appointed to the Land Use Committee. He also served as a member of the committees on Economic Development, Education, Higher Education, Environmental Protection, and Operations. In 2001, Carrión travelled to Puerto Rico with three associates, including the Rev. Al Sharpton, to protest the Navy’s bombing exercises on the island of Vieques. The “Vieques Four” garnered national attention when they were imprisoned by the federal government for more than 40 days for protesting this policy. Their sacrifice raised awareness about the damaging impact of the Navy’s activities on the Puerto Rican population and led to President Bush’s imposition of a permanent moratorium on weapons testing on the island. That same year, Carrión won a hotly contested race to become Borough President of The Bronx. During his time in office, Carrión ushered in an era of building and economic growth in The Bronx that created thousands of new jobs. His efforts helped increase annual investment in the borough from $361 million in 2002 to almost $1 billion in 2008. During his tenure, he spearheaded the development and rehabilitation of 40,000 housing units, 50 new schools, and two million square feet of office and commercial space. Working with the Governor, the Mayor, and his colleagues in the NYC Council and the NYS Assembly, Carrión shepherded the plan for a new Yankee Stadium and the revitalization of the area surrounding the stadium by including new parks, transportation and retail.In 2007, Carrión was elected President of the National Association of Latino Elected Officials (NALEO), where he served two terms as head of the nation's preeminent non-partisan Latino leadership organization.In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Carrión to be his Deputy Assistant and first Director of the White House Office of Urban Affairs. In this new role, Carrión was charged with executing the President’s agenda to revitalize our nation’s cities. Carrión’s work at the White House resulted in the establishment of a White House Urban Policy Working Group, as well as a comprehensive interagency review of the federal government’s engagement with urban and metropolitan areas. It was the first review of its kind in 30 years. Carrión launched a set of policies and initiatives that aligned the work of federal agencies to offer place-based competitive opportunities for stakeholders throughout the country. These initiatives included, among others, Regional Planning and Sustainability Grants, Promise Neighborhoods, the Interagency Partnership on Sustainable Communities, The White House Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative, a coordinated effort to end veterans’ homelessness, and a proposal to Congress for a National Infrastructure Bank.In 2010, Carrión was confirmed by the United States Senate as Regional Administrator of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for Region II, encompassing New York and New Jersey. He also served as HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan’s Advisor on Intergovernmental Relations. As Regional Administrator, Carrión was responsible for overseeing nearly $6 billion in HUD investments in New York and New Jersey. He worked with members of Congress, mayors, city managers, and local public and private sector stakeholders to ensure HUD’s programs worked to create economically competitive, environmentally sustainable and opportunity-rich communities.After completing his posts in government service, Carrión founded Metro Futures, LLC, a consulting and real estate development firm. He also currently serves as Senior Advisor for Corporate Development of the CSA Group, the largest Hispanic-owned architectural, engineering, environmental services, consulting, construction and program management firm in the United States.Carrión is an Aspen Institute Rodel Fellow alum, has served on numerous governing boards of not-for-profit and governmental entities, and is a renowned speaker on issues related to urban policy, smart growth, demographics, and metropolitan and regional planning.Carrión holds a master’s degree in urban planning from the City University of New York at Hunter College, and a bachelor’s degree from Kings College.Adolfo Carrión, Jr. was born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in 1961 to Elisa and Adolfo Carrión, who had immigrated to New York City from Puerto Rico in the 1950s. Pursuing their American Dream, Carrión’s parents moved next to the Lower East Side of Manhattan with their four children before finally purchasing a home and settling in the Bronx.Carrión is the proud father of three daughters and a son. An avid cook, he and his wife Linda live in the Bronx and enjoy cycling, fishing, golfing and running in New York City’s park system.

As Comptroller of New York City from 2002 through 2009, Bill Thompson was responsible for managing the finances of the nation's largest municipality and supervised a staff of 700 professionals. As a lifelong Democrat and the city's top financial watchdog, he oversaw the city's $100 billion pension fund and made crucial investments in affordable housing for lower- and middle-class families.Because of a last-minute change to the city's charter revision law, Bill was given the opportunity to run for a third term in 2009. He chose not to violate the two-term limit put in place by the voters, announcing that he would run for Mayor of New York City instead. As the Democratic nominee, Bill was outspent 14 to 1 and still came within just a few percentage points of unseating a lavishly self-financed incumbent.A product of New York City's public schools, Bill has a deep understanding of the needs of both students and educators. As the head of the Board of Education for five terms, he oversaw a school system with 1.1 million students and 130,000 employees. He has been a persistent champion of meaningful accountability, more extensive after-school programs, an expanded arts curriculum, and higher standards of teaching.More recently, Bill served as Chairman of the Hugh L. Carey Battery Park City Authority, and is also Chair of Governor Cuomo's Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprise Team, which seeks to promote economic opportunities and eliminate barriers for minority- and women-owned businesses.In addition to his eight years of service as a citywide executive, Bill has valuable private sector experience. He currently serves as the Chief Administrative Officer and Senior Managing Director at Siebert, Brandford, Shank & Co. LLC, the nation's largest minority public finance firm, where he leads efforts to underwrite loans for schools, roads, bridges and infrastructure projects.A son of Bedford-Stuyvesant who moved to Manhattan in 2008 after a lifetime in Brooklyn, Bill is proud of what he calls his dual citizenship. He lives in Harlem with his wife, Elsie McCabe Thompson, and two stepchildren. He is also the proud father of a grown daughter, Jennifer.

Patty is a member of the Financial Institutions and Sovereigns department of Bayern LB where she has both relationship management and credit responsibilities. The bank’s facilities support municipal VRDBs and CP programs. Patty has been following the electric and water sectors since she began her career in the municipal utilities department of S&P. She has become increasingly involved in the water space and has participated in roundtable discussions and conferences.Patty has a broad range of experience in the municipal and corporate markets including banking (BayernLB and TD Securities) rating agency (S&P and Fitch), buyside (Westinghouse Pension Investment Corp., Bankers Trust and Offitbank) and sell side (Bear Stearns).Patty is a member of the CFA Institute, the New York Society of Securities Analysts, the Municipal Analysts Group of New York (Program Committee member) and, the National Federation of Municipal Analysts. She is a graduate of SUNY New Paltz with a BS in Business Administration. Patty achieved the CFA designation in 2000.

Jill Schmidt is a senior underwriter in BAM�s Eastern Regional Group. She joins BAM from Assured Guaranty, where she was a Vice President in Public Finance. Prior to joining Assured Guaranty in June of 2010, she was a Director in the Global Power Group at Fitch Ratings. Before that, she spent five years at FGIC, where she was a Vice President, Surveillance and prior to that, she was a research analyst at Moody�s Investors Service, Inc. She is a graduate of Clarkson University and holds a Master�s Degree in Business Administration from Baruch College. She is a member of the Municipal Analysts Group of New York, the National Federation of Municipal Analysts and Women in Public Finance.