Elizabeth (Liz) joined MHIC in October 2020 as Director of Capital Development. Liz is a passionate real estate professional with nearly fifteen years of experience in commercial real estate investing/lending. Prior to her appointment at MHIC, she served as a Senior Credit Officer on the Commercial Real Estate lending credit team at State Street, which included credit authority for Tax Advantaged Investments. Before joining State Street, Liz spent four years at Citizens Bank, building out a formalized Community Development equity investment platform and contributed to strategic initiatives including collaboratively pioneering the Bank’s efforts to build out a New Market Tax Credit investment structure.
Liz also represented Citizens on the Affordable Housing Investors Council (AHIC) Planning Committee. Prior to that, Liz was actively engaged for over five years in the asset management and origination of low-income housing properties with a national tax credit syndicator. In addition to her professional endeavors, Liz continues to foster her passion of charitable skills-based volunteering throughout the community. Liz is the Vice Chair of the Norwell Community Housing Trust. She is also on the Board of Trustees/Grant Review Committee for Charlesbank Homes, a non-profit with the mission to support the development of affordable housing throughout the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Most recently, Liz was appointed to the Board of Overseers for the Boston Children’s Museum where she is supporting fundraising efforts for the proposed “Our City: Building Kindness and Empathy Exhibition”. Liz is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts Amherst with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and a double-minor in Psychology and Sociology.
Catherine Cawthon is President and CEO of Ohio Capital Corporation for Housing. Catherine comes to OCCH from Fifth Third Community Development Corporation where she served as President and was responsible for business development, origination and asset management functions for the bank. The Fifth Third CDC invests in community projects that support affordable housing, economic revitalization and stabilization as well as job creation. The CDC’s portfolio includes low-income housing, historic and new market tax credit projects as well as investments to CDFI’s. Under her leadership, Fifth Third CDC invested over $4.5 billion in more than five hundred projects.
As President and CEO at OCCH, Catherine oversees all corporate policy and fiscal affairs, including securing corporate investors for Low Income Housing Tax Credit equity funds and coordinating efforts to develop housing projects receiving equity investment from the Ohio Equity Funds. To date, Ohio Capital Corporation has raised more than $5 billion in corporate equity for LIHTC projects involving more than 900 transactions and 50,000 units of affordable housing in Ohio, Kentucky, and surrounding states.
Catherine has served on boards including Affordable Housing Investor Council, United Way, Local Initiatives Support Corporation and the Ohio Community Development Finance Fund. Currently, Catherine serves on the Ohio Housing Council and Council for Rural Housing in Ohio’s Advisory Board and Chairs the Joint Columbus and Franklin County Housing Advisory Board.
Catherine graduated from Illinois State University and earned an MBA from Indiana Wesleyan University.