Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer

Levar Martin

As Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer, Levar Martin oversees NALCAB’s national programs and special projects, operations, lending, and HR/Organizational Culture. He also supports governance, strategic planning, fundraising, and strategic partnerships. Levar guides NALCAB’s Latino Executive Advancement and Development (LEAD) program in partnership with The George Washington University.

Levar leads NALCAB’s financial and investment strategies, overseeing the organization’s lending activities, including its work as a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) intermediary and management of an $18 million loan fund. He also directs two off-balance sheet national social impact funds focused on expanding and preserving affordable housing and providing capital to small businesses and entrepreneurs.

Levar began his career at NALCAB in 2011 as a Program Assistant, where he tracked job creation and the economic impact of a $137 million Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP2). Since then, he has held multiple roles across the organization, including leading the expansion of NALCAB’s National Neighborhood Development program and leveraging Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to develop methodologies for analyzing neighborhood change and identifying risks of gentrification.

Before joining NALCAB, Levar worked as a manager for a small business and interned with the City of San Antonio’s Department of Planning and Community Development, focusing on GIS.

Levar currently serves on Truist Bank’s Texas Advisory Committee, the Board of Directors for RAISE Texas, and the Small Business Anti-Displacement (SBAN) Advisory Board of the National Center for Smart Growth Research and Education at the University of Maryland. He received the 2018 Rising Star Award for Urban and Regional Planning from UTSA and completed the NeighborWorks America Achieving Excellence Executive Education Program at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government in 2019. In 2023, Levar was recognized as one of LISC San Antonio’s Impact Leaders.

Levar holds a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology with a concentration in Urban Studies from Trinity University and a Master of Science in Urban and Regional Planning from the Klesse College of Engineering and Integrated Design at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA).