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Regional Housing Trust &
Affordable Housing Forum
The San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments (SGVCOG) proudly presented its Regional Housing Trust & Affordable Housing Forum on Thursday, February 13, 2020. This event brought together elected officials, city staff, and community leaders to explore innovative housing projects and affordable housing funding mechanisms in California. Additionally, the event highlighted details and updates of the San Gabriel Valley Regional Housing Trust. Speakers and panelists shared innovative building practices, such as bridge housing, modular dwelling units, and micro-community units, and presented various funding programs that encourage developments of affordable housing units and accessory dwelling units (ADUs).
Innovative Building Practices Presentations
Affordable Housing Funding Presentations
Featured Speakers
Alexandra Dawson
Community Development Officer, Los Angeles Local Initiatives Support Corporation (L.A. LISC)
At LISC, Ms. Dawson structures, underwrites, and manages all types of real estate investments including acquisition, predevelopment, construction, and permanent loans that facilitate the production and preservation of affordable rental housing and community facilities in Los Angeles and surrounding regions. Additionally, she implements affordable housing related technical assistance programming including LISC’s Housing Development Training Institute. Prior to joining LISC, Alex worked for Cesar Chavez Foundation as a Project Manager in the Housing and Economic Development Department where she was responsible for managing all aspects of affordable housing development projects from predevelopment to placed-in-service.
Featured Speakers
Jennifer Kim
Housing Innovation Director, Office of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti
Jen Kim works to create systems change and supports innovative solutions to expand the supply of supportive housing throughout the City of Los Angeles. She oversees the Mayor’s HHH Housing Challenge, a Request for Proposals that seeks creative approaches to supportive housing development. Prior to joining Mayor Garcetti’s office, Ms. Kim served as the housing lead for the Chief Executive Office of the County of Los Angeles. As the housing lead, Ms. Kim developed and implemented the Housing Innovation Challenge, an open competition that solicited creative financing and construction methods to build supportive housing faster and at a lower cost than what is currently possible.
Linda Braunschweiger
Chief Executive Officer, Housing Trust Fund Ventura County
Ms. Braunschweiger has spent over thirty years in finance, affordable housing development, non-profit management and business. She spent many years in public affairs and lobbying at the federal, state and local levels. Ms. Braunschweiger started in 2010 as a contract founding CEO, becoming a full time employee in 2017, of the Housing Trust Fund Ventura County (HTFVC). She helped orchestrate the formation of HTFVC, raised over $6 million in public, private and charitable funds, and funded $9 million in short-term loans of which the majority has already been repaid, producing 365 new affordable housing units. Under her leadership, HTFVC became a certified Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) at the Federal and State level.
Miguel Rivera
Associate, Perkins&Will
Growing up in a low-income family, Miguel always knew he was interested in design. Over the course of his career, his passion for bringing high-quality and innovative design solutions to communities with limited resources grew. He has worked with public and private agencies and with non-profit developers on projects ranging from large-scale planning efforts to affordable and interim housing facilities and small residential landscapes for low-income residents throughout Los Angeles. Miguel regularly attends community meetings to support affordable housing developments, volunteers at interim housing facilities, and is leading the Los Angeles Studio efforts on affordable/interim housing.
Paul Sungmin Cho
Manager, Illumination Housing, LLC. / Board Member, LifeArk Community, Inc.
Paul Sungmin Cho is the Manager of Illumination Housing, LLC, a social impact investment fund recently established to accelerate homeless housing solutions. He is also a board member of LifeArk Community Inc., a non-profit focused on innovating modular housing for the marginalized communities. In 2008, Paul co-founded The Illumination Foundation (“IF”). IF combines housing and comprehensive wrap-around services to assist homeless families and individuals. Previously, Paul spent 16 years in investment banking working for Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch in New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and Seoul. Paul graduated from Harvard University with a B.A. degree in Economics and has a Healthcare Executive MBA degree from UC Irvine.