About NALCAB: Leadership
Noel Andrés Poyo, Executive Director
Noel Andrés Poyo is a next generation leader in the community development and asset building fields. As Executive Director of NALCAB - the National Association for Latino Community Asset Builders - he represents and serves a network of more than fifty Latino-led, community-based organizations that focus on family wealth building and community asset development in middle and lower-income urban neighborhoods and rural areas around the country.
As a private consultant, Mr. Poyo developed an impressive track record of planning, implementing and evaluating affordable housing and supportive service programs, including having worked on more than twenty HOPE VI public housing revitalization projects. He has raised millions of dollars for clients including private developers, non-profit community development corporations and public housing authorities. He also has extensive experience developing and implementing plans for the recovery of troubled municipal agencies. Prior to establishing his own consulting practice, he applied his entrepreneurial skills and spirit to leading the marketing and development division of a private firm that serves the owners, managers and residents of affordable housing communities.
Mr. Poyo’s experience also includes having served on the Board of Commissioners of the Housing Authority of Baltimore City (the nation’s tenth largest public housing authority) and the Board of Directors of the Baltimore Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Poyo is a graduate of Yale University.
Patricia Mejia, Deputy Director
Patricia Mejia was appointed the Program Director of NALCAB- National Association for Latino Community Asset Builders in 2007. The mission of NALCAB is to build financial and real estate assets as well as human and technology resources in Latino families, communities and organizations.
Prior to joining NALCAB, Ms. Mejia served as the Executive Director of the 21st Century Leadership Center at St. Mary's University in San Antonio, Texas. The Center worked to nurture and develop a new generation of leaders committed and equipped to building and positively transforming communities. During her tenure, she assisted in training 800 civic and community leaders and another 1,500 college and high school students who focus their work in low- and middle income communities.
Mejia’s extensive experience in community based leadership development includes work with the following organizations: the National Latino Children’s Institute, the Hispanic Summit of Nevada, and the U.S. Hispanic Leadership Institute. In her work, Mejia nurtures the development and practice of leadership skills such as: community mobilization, marshalling community assets, advocacy, and relationship building.
Mejia also serves on the board of Voices for Children San Antonio as well as serves as an adjunct professor of Political Science and Leadership. Patricia is a dual graduate of St. Mary's University, receiving a Bachelor of Arts in 2001 and a Masters of Arts in 2004.
Mejia is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Social Policy with a concentration in Assets and Inequalities at the Heller School of Social Policy and Managment at Brandeis University in Massachusetts.
