Category Archive: PHLF News
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Dr. Howard B. Slaughter, Jr. to Speak at Seton Hill University and Carnegie Mellon University in April
PHLF News
April 2, 2009KEYNOTE SPEAKER:
Howard B. Slaughter, Jr.D.Sc., MBA, Chief Executive Officer
Landmarks Community Capital Corporation
“Collaborative Community Development as a Means for Regional Revitalization and Entrepreneurship”
Dr. Slaughter serves as the CEO of Landmarks Community Capital Corporation (LCCC). The non-profit corporation’s focus is to provide equity, debt, and short and intermediate term financing for housing and economic development activities in western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, and West Virginia markets. LCCC built a financial base by obtaining loans, grants, and investment capital and, in turn, finances and develops projects that assist in the revitalization of urban centers, towns, and neighborhoods.
The corporation undertakes actual developments, serves as a co-developer and/or lends funds to community development corporations and others that undertake such work. LCCC also works to support the expansion of the regional employment base, green and sustainable goals, and to assist rural and farm economic development.
Dr. Howard B. Slaughter, Jr., was the former Director of the Pittsburgh Fannie Mae Community Business Center for eight years. He was also the Vice President for Community Development at Dollar Bank, where he led the bank to its first ever Outstanding CRA rating.
He possesses over twenty-five years of lending experience in non-profit consumer financial services and regional commercial banking.
Dr. Slaughter holds five earned degrees, including a Master’s Degree from Carnegie Mellon University in Public Management and his Doctorate in Information Systems and Communications from Robert Morris University.
He also completed the Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and course work on Fundamentals of Real Estate Finance at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Real Estate.
Dr. Slaughter is also a Fannie Mae Foundation Fellow and serves on the Boards of the Urban League of Pittsburgh as Treasurer; The Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, where he received a gubernatorial appointment from Governor Ed Rendell; The Pittsburgh Foundation; and he was appointed as a member of the Minority and Women Business Enterprise of Allegheny County by Chief Executive Dan Onorato. He is also a member of the Pennsylvania Community Development Bank, appointed by Former Governor and Home Land Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
He is also the Founder of the Financial Literacy Program of Pittsburgh at Robert Morris University. He recently attended the Yale CEO Institute and the Brookings Institute Conference as a Partner.
- Seton Hill University Event
- Thursday, April 23, 2009
- 6:00 – 7:30 p.m.
- Administration Building 206
- Carnegie-Mellon University Event
- Thursday, April 30, 2009
- School Of Architecture
- 2:30 p.m.
- Seton Hill University Event
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Dr. Howard B. Slaughter Among Those Elected to The Pittsburgh Foundation Board
New role created for local nonprofit leaders
April 1, 2009
PHLF NewsThe Pittsburgh Foundation has broadened membership of its Board of Directors to include community leadership representing key nonprofit organizations serving the southwestern Pennsylvania region.
Two positions have been created under the initiative, and the first directors elected to the Foundation’s Board to serve in this role are Lisa Schroeder, Executive Director of Riverlife, and Walter Smith, Ph.D., Executive Director of Family Resources, who will each serve a single three-year term.
The Foundation also elected three new full-term Board members, Maxwell King, Executive Director of the Fred Rogers Center, Claudette Lewis, Special Assistant to the Director of Allegheny County Department of Human Services, and Howard B. Slaughter, Jr., D.Sc., President and Chief Executive Officer of Landmarks Community Capital Corp., who each are eligible to serve up to three, three-year terms.
Additionally, former Foundation Chairman, George A. Davidson, Jr. who retired from the Board in March 2008, was re-elected following a one-year absence and he also may serve up to three, three-year terms. The elections increase the Board’s membership to 19 directors.
“As our region’s community foundation and a fulcrum for local philanthropy it is vital that we maintain strong and diverse Board membership that is representative of our community,” said Greg Curtis, Chairman of the Foundation’s Board of Directors. “The Foundation is entering a new era as an agent for transformative change in our community, and I am delighted to welcome our new Board members whose knowledge, insight and passionate commitment will be of invaluable support.”
“I am especially pleased that our Board includes representatives of nonprofit organizations, since this sector is central to the Foundation’s missions and to our successful engagement with and understanding of the critical needs and issues in our Pittsburgh region,” said Grant Oliphant, the Foundation’s President and CEO.
Under Lisa Schroeder’s leadership, Riverlife – established in 1999 to create a vision and master plan for Pittsburgh’s riverfronts – is creating a metropolitan scale waterfront park along 12 miles in the heart of Pittsburgh, comprised of new parks, water landings, bridge connections and lighting.
Ms. Schroeder raises capital funds from public and private sources and manages liaison with elected officials, foundations, nonprofit organizations and commercial real estate owners and developers.
Dr. Walter Smith joined Family Resources in 1987 and became Executive Director in 1997. Family Resources serves more than 20,000 children, teens and adults residing in Allegheny County with concerns related to preventing and treating child abuse and neglect. Dr. Smith is a licensed psychologist with a private practice that specializes in treating children, couples, and families. He is the founding member of the Western Pennsylvania Family Center, an education resource center for lay and professional persons interested in family therapy and family studies.
Maxwell King is the Executive Director of the Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children’s Media at Saint Vincent College. The Center was established in 2003 to serve as a national and international resource for addressing emerging issues affecting children and families. Mr. King retired as President of The Heinz Endowments in 2007, where he led initiatives to improve the quality of life of this community and presided over the awarding of more than $500 million in grants.
As Special Assistant to the Director, Allegheny County Department of Human Services, Claudette Lewis has been responsible for the implementation of Change Management processes during the consolidation of the agency. She has spent the past twenty years spearheading important social causes for several non-profit organizations: the Episcopal Urban Caucus in Washington, DC; the Connecticut Interfaith Housing Coalition in Hartford, Connecticut; and the Housing Authority’s HOPE VI Project in New Haven, Connecticut. Mrs. Lewis is married to The Reverend Dr. Harold Lewis, the rector of Calvary Episcopal Church in Shadyside.
Dr. Howard B. Slaughter, Jr. is President and Chief Executive Officer of Landmarks Community Capital Corporation, a non-profit and Chief Executive Officer of Landmarks Development Corporation, a for-profit, both wholly owned subsidiaries of the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation. Both companies provide economic development financing to nonprofit and private developers respectively in Western Pennsylvania, Eastern Ohio and West Virginia. He was formerly Director of Fannie Mae’s Pittsburgh Community Business Center; he also served as Vice President of Dollar Bank’s Community Development, where he led the bank to its first ever “outstanding” CRA rating and he received a gubernatorial appointment and was unanimously confirmed by the Pennsylvania State Senate to the board of the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency. He is also the Treasurer of the Board of the Urban League of Greater Pittsburgh and has received numerous local, regional, educational and national awards for charitable and community service.
George A. Davidson, Jr., is the retired Chairman of the Board of Dominion Resources. Mr. Davidson previously served for 18 years on the Foundation’s Board, most recently as Chairman. He is a Trustee and past Chairman of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, Chairman Emeritus of the Civic Light Opera and a member of the Boards of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and the Sewickley Valley Hospital Foundation. Mr. Davidson is a Trustee of the University of Pittsburgh, Chairs the Board of Visitors of the Katz Graduate School of Business and is Vice Chair of the Board of Visitors of the School of Engineering.
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Landmarks supports the nomination of the Old Stone Tavern as a City-Designated Historic Structure.
PREPARED TESTIMONY OF
ANNE E. NELSON, ESQ.
GENERAL COUNSEL
PITTSBURGH HISTORY & LANDMARKS FOUNDATION
BEFORE HISTORIC REVIEW COMMISSION, CITY OF PITTSBURGH
PUBLIC HEARING ON THE OLD STONE TAVERN
CITY HISTORIC STRUCTURE NOMINATIONApril 1, 2009
Landmarks supports the nomination of the Old Stone Tavern to become a City-Designated Historic Structure.
The building was surveyed in both of Landmarks’ architectural surveys of Allegheny County and was chosen for inclusion in Landmark Architecture of Allegheny County Pennsylvania by James D. Van Trump and Arthur P. Ziegler, Jr., published in 1967, and Pittsburgh’s Landmark Architecture by Walter Kidney, published in 1997.
Walter Kidney dates the building c. 1800 since it is “a work in masonry not logs.” Van Trump and Ziegler describe the building as “[o]ne of the earliest surviving local taverns,” and state that “[t]his tavern must be preserved….”
Therefore, Landmarks supports the nomination of the Old Stone Tavern.
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Dr. Howard B. Slaughter Elected President of Landmarks Community Capital Corporation
March 19, 2009
PHLF NewsLandmark Community Capital Corporation is pleased to announce that Howard Slaughter has been elected president.
PHLF launched LCCC in October 2007 and under Dr. Slaughter’s leadership as CEO, it has expanded our geographic range and increased our lending to non-profit organizations substantially.
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Landmarks Joins City of Chicago’s Appeal of Landmark Decision
by Anne E. Nelson, General Counsel
PHLF News
March 11, 2009On March 11, 2009, Landmarks joined the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Landmarks Illinois, New York Landmarks Conservancy, Cleveland Restoration Society, sixty-three Illinois municipalities and other organizations in filing an amicus curiae motion before the Supreme Court of Illinois in the case Hanna v. City of Chicago. In Hanna, two Chicago property owners challenged the constitutionality of the city’s landmark ordinance creating a historic district that included the property they owned. The property owners were successful at the appellate court level.
The brief urged the Supreme Court of Illinois to accept the City of Chicago’s Leave to Appeal and to reverse the appellate court’s decision that Chicago’s landmarks ordinance was “vague, ambiguous, and overly broad,” and that, as such, the ordinance amounted to an unconstitutional delegation of discretionary authority by the Chicago City Council to the Landmarks Commission.
The brief made the following four arguments:
- The appellate court’s opinion threatens the validity of similar laws and ordinances throughout Illinois;
- The United States District Court upheld the constitutionality of Chicago’s landmark ordinance against a vagueness challenge in 1977 and 1994;
- In other states, courts have overwhelmingly rejected vagueness challenges to criteria for designating landmarks and historic districts in local preservation ordinances; and
- Courts have upheld preservation ordinances in 24 states and the District of Columbia against vagueness and unlawful delegation claims.
On March 24, 2009, the Illinois Supreme Court denied the motion of the amici to file a state in support of the City of Chicago’s petition. While disappointing, the filing was still successful in calling the court’s attention to the many cities and organizations from around the nation that support the City of Chicago’s position.
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Dormont Pool Receives Funds for Repairs
by Arthur P. Ziegler, Jr., President
March 4th, 2009
PHLF NewsFriends of the Dormont Pool, which formed to save this huge swimming pool when the Borough was going to close it because of the expense of repairing it, has continued to raise funds to keep the pool open and on St. Patrick’s Day presented the Borough with a check for another $50,000 to continue the repair program.
For more information, see:
http://friendsofdormontpool.org/
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Alan Frank House Foundation Formed
March 4th, 2009
PHLF NewsThe Alan I.W. Frank Foundation has been launched as a 501(c)(3) to raise funds to secure the house designed by Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer for Alan and Cecelia Frank on Woodland Road near Chatham College.
It has been faithfully preserved by their son Alan Frank. This is the largest private residence designed by the Gropius-Breuer partnership.
The house has four levels of living space, an indoor swimming pool, and a rooftop dance floor. The furnishings were either designed by Breuer or chosen by the architects.
The first effort of the foundation will be to secure the open land behind the house leading to Shady Avenue which will be essential for operating the house in the future as a possible house museum.
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The Sweeney Hotel and Saloon To Be Preserved
March 4th, 2009
PHLF NewsAt the request of Senator Jim Ferlo and the Natrona Comes Together Association in the Natrona Flats, Landmarks helped the organization secure the vacant Sweeney Hotel and Saloon built in 1900 at 36 Chestnut Street. Over the years the hotel had become a bank, an antique store, and finally The Vault Theatre, before it closed again.
Utilizing a grant from Senator Ferlo and a planned giving solution we developed, we were able to obtain the ownership of the building for the Natrona Comes Together Association.
A further grant from the Senator is enabling us to install a new roof and repair the elegant cornice work on the building. The future use for the building is still being discussed within the larger context of the Natrona’s ongoing revitalization efforts.
