Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Miriam Horn, a clean technology specialist, manages the smart grid initiative at Environmental Defense Fund. She is a project leader on Austin’s Pecan Street Project, which recently won a $10m stimulus grant for a fully integrated smart-grid demonstration in a green-built neighborhood; the project will combine advanced metering and communications with distributed generation (including coop-owned solar and building integrated PV), storage, plug-in hybrid cars, smart appliances, smart water and sophisticated consumer controls. Project goals include maximizing and monetizing the full suite of environmental benefits, and developing new business models and an open platform to maximize participation by entrepreneurs and innovators. With Environmental Defense Fund president Fred Krupp, Horn co-authored the New York Times bestseller Earth: The Sequel, The Race to Reinvent Energy and Stop Global Warming (Norton, 2008). Earth: The Sequel was chosen a “best book of the year” by Fast Company; a Discovery Channel documentary based on the book aired in March 2009. Horn is a frequent public speaker; recent appearances include the keynote at the Solartech-CALSEIA Inaugural Summit and talks at the United Nations, ABA, Monterey Institute for International Studies, New York University, University of Michigan Law School and Tsinghua University, Beijing. She was a panelist with deputy energy secretary Cathy Zoi at a recent New Enterprise Associates forum and was a finals judge for MIT’s 2009 Ignite Clean Energy (ICE) prize. Horn has worked for the U.S. Forest Service and written for numerous newspapers and magazines, including Vanity Fair, The New Republic, and the New York Times. She is the author of Rebels in White Gloves; Coming of Age with Hillary’s Class—Wellesley ’69 (Times Books, 1999). A graduate of Harvard University, Horn studied environmental science at Columbia University and lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.

Mr. Hill began his professional career as a financial analyst for SMUD (Sacramento Municipal Utility District) evaluating the financial and economic feasibility of the Rancho Seco Nuclear Power Plant in the mid-1980s. In addition to working for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, Mr. Hill worked for the State of California in the Office of Energy Assessments to develop financing programs for the State’s facility energy efficiency upgrades.  Mr. Hill has worked as a financial advisor to California public agencies for over 21 years on projects as vast as amusement parks, community facilities, infrastructure and master planned development projects.  His finance work includes general obligation bonds, land-secured tax bonds, lease and tax increment financings as well as utility revenue bonds.  Since 2007 Mr. Hill has been developing the energy financing programs for school districts, cities and counties. Mr. Hill currently serves as financial advisor to over 50 different public agencies throughout California.  Mr. Hill is currently working with the Cities of Berkeley, Davis, Santa Cruz as well as the City and County of San Francisco to develop their solar financing programs.Prior to founding Northcross, Hill & Ach, Inc. in 2000, he started Project Finance Associates in 1995.Mr. Hill received B.S. degrees in Managerial Economics and Agricultural Economics from the University of California at Davis.

Mr. Fink joined Merrill Lynch in 2003 after managing the Public Power Group at Morgan Stanley. During his 24 years in municipal finance, Mr. Fink has represented many of the largest and most innovative municipal utilities and cooperatives, including CPS San Antonio, LIPA, American Municipal Power, the Oklahoma Municipal Power Authority, Santee Cooper, SRP,� MEAG Power, the Florida Municipal Power Agency, the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, LADWP, SCPPA, UAMPS, Austin Utilities, the Utility Board of Key West, Owensboro Municipal Utilities, the Lower Colorado River Authority, the Southern Minnesota Municipal Power Agency, the Omaha Public Power District, the New York Power Authority, Pedernales Electric Cooperative, Minnkota Power and the Illinois Municipal Electric Agency. Mr. Fink has also served as Financial Advisor to LIPA, Santee Cooper and the Gainesville Regional Utilities. Prior to his investment banking career, Mr. Fink was a practicing tax attorney for eight years at both Mudge Rose Guthrie Alexander & Ferdon and Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy. As such, he is intimately familiar with the legal and tax issues of municipal finance. Mr. Fink remains active and up-to-date on developments in the law of municipal taxation and is a member and frequent panelist for the National Association of Bond Lawyers (“NABL”) and the American Bar Association. Mr. Fink also chaired NABL’s first workshop on public power. Mr. Fink was recently named as the Florida Municipal Electric Association’s Associate Member of the Year for his work in public power.Mr. Fink is serving on the Large Public Power Council (“LPPC”) Finance Task Force on Nuclear Power and has testified in Department of Energy Hearings on behalf of LPPC. LPPC is a Washington D.C. based lobbying organization set up by many of the nation’s largest municipal utilities.Mr. Fink received his B.A. from the State University of New York at Albany, his J.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo (with a concentration in state and local government law) and his LL.M. in Taxation from New York University School of Law.

Peter V. Murphy is a senior director at Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services, having joined Standard & Poor’s in 1993 as a public finance ratings analyst. He is currently the public power ratings group leader and spokesperson.   Peter joined He has extensive credit experience in assessing the credit quality of public power, cooperatives, infrastructure, and state and local government bonds. He has covered several major issuers, including Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, Seattle City Light, WA, Colorado Springs Utilities, Southern California Public Power Authority, Seattle, WA, Orlando, FL, Memphis Light Gas & Water TN, Huntsville, AL, and Chugach Electric Association.  Peter has published dozens of articles covering the public power sector, including those on industry trends, criteria, renewable energy.Peter holds a B.S. and M.B.A. degrees from Fordham University.  He is also a member of the American Public Power Association, and the Municipal Analysts Group of New York.

Jim Hoecker is Senior Counsel to Husch Blackwell Sanders in Washington, D.C., where he focuses his practice on emerging markets in the wholesale electric and natural gas areas. He is also a Principal at Hoecker Energy Law & Policy, PLLC (HELP), a law and public policy firm that assists energy providers, customers, and policymakers with electric power, natural gas transportation, and related regulatory, environmental, and climate change matters. He also represents a major national non-profit trade association that advocates increased investment in electric transmission infrastructure. Dr. Hoecker works with electric utilities, utility investors, transmission companies, renewable energy firms, and gas and oil pipelines on regulatory and transactional matters in North America. Prior to rejoining private practice, Dr. Hoecker served as Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, from 1997-2001 during the Clinton Administration and before that, as a FERC Commissioner for four years. As Chairman, he was responsible for instituting regional transmission organizations to administer the bulk electric power system and streamlining regulatory processes. Dr. Hoecker has practiced energy law for 31 years and speaks and publishes widely on energy and infrastructure issues. He holds advanced degrees from the University of Wisconsin and the University of Kentucky. For more information: see www.helppllc.com and www.huschblackwell.com.

Kim Du'Prey joined the Illinois Finance Authority, IFA, in July, 2009 as a Senior Funding Manager working with local governments, school districts and other public sector clients. She administers the IFA’s Bond Bank Program, coordinating and structuring the financing needs of the IFA’s Borrowers (local governmental units) with underwriters and various legal counsels to originate the IFA’s pooled bond issues which offer its participants dual exempt financing, lower costs of issuance through economies of scale and in, most cases, the credit enhancement of the State’s Moral Obligation. She is a member of the IFA’s Renewable Energy Team and sector leader on the Energy Efficiency Team.Kim’s experience and knowledge of the secondary tax exempt and taxable municipal capital markets were gained from her eight years on the sales and trading desks at Merrill Lynch and twelve years with Citigroup. Prior to joining the IFA, she was a Public Finance Investment Banker with D.A. Davidson & Co. in Chicago, focused on debt origination, and served as a Financial Advisor to the City of Chicago, State of Illinois and the IFA. Worked on restructuring transactions and credit enhancement guarantees which allowed public finance clients to regain marketability and reduce interest rate costs on their short-term debt instruments after numerous municipal bond Insurer and Bank downgrades, investment bank insolvencies and mergers. B.S. in Finance, University of Illinois at Chicago FINRA Licenses: Series 7, 63 & 53.

Jeff  Pitkin is Treasurer and the chief financial officer of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), a position he has held since 2001.  He previously served as Controller and Assistant Treasurer since 1991.  He has current responsibilities for accounting and financial reporting, budgeting, contract management, bond financing, information technology and information security, and internal controls.Previously, Mr. Pitkin was Controller for Trans World Music Corporation and was a Senior Accountant for Ernst & Young.  He is a certified public accountant, and received a BBA in Accounting from Siena College.

Ms. Hayes serves as the Director of Capital Ventures, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army, Installations, Energy, & Environment. With over 20 years experience in housing/project management at the installation, Major Command, and Secretariat levels, Ms. Hayes brings a wealth of field experience to the Installations & Housing office.   She began her professional career as a Department of the Army Housing Intern at Fort Hood, TX and was subsequently assigned as a Housing Referral/Customer Service Manager.  After completing assignments as Branch Chief in Family Housing, Unaccompanied Personnel Housing, and Facilities Management, Ms. Hayes was promoted to the senior housing management level and served as Housing Division Chief both at Darmstadt, Germany and Fort Meade, MD.   Ms. Hayes’ served as Deputy Director for Public Works at Fort Meade, MD.  From this position, she began working housing privatization issues and was ultimately selected to work in the RCI Office in the Army Secretariat at the Pentagon.  Serving as a senior program manager and Deputy Director of the RCI program, Rhonda led the efforts on RCI source selection evaluation boards and was responsible for strategic planning, project scheduling, and overall RCI program execution involving 44 Army installations.  She also has responsibility for negotiating privatization projects for Privatization of Army Lodging (PAL) and Single Soldier Unaccompanied Housing.Ms. Hayes has a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the University of Arkansas and has completed post-Master’s graduate work at the University of Maryland, School of Public Affairs.  She is a member of the Professional Housing Management Association (PHMA). Rhonda brings the dual perspective of housing professional and military spouse to all her assignments.  She is married to an Army officer and has three daughters.

Larry Weis is a native of Washington State. He began his Utility career in 1981 as the Commercial Energy Supervisor for the Snohomish Public Utility District in Everett, Washington and later promoted to the operations side of the business as an Area Manager. In 1990, he was hired as the General Manager for the Pend Oreille Public Utility District, also in Washington State. He held that post for ten years before being selected after a nationwide search to become the CEO and General Manager of the TID in 2000. TID operates one of the largest irrigation systems in the state serving the agriculturally rich Central Valley in California.   Its electric utility is among the 30 largest public power utilities in the United States. He has lead the acquisition and construction of a variety of facilities ranging from power transmission, small and large scale hydroelectric, thermal generation and renewable energy projects.  Larry serves or has served for many associations and joint action agencies regionally and nationally within the utility industry, including current service as a board member for the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) and the Northwest Public Power Association (NWPPA). He is also involved at the local level and most notably is on the Board for California State University-Stanislaus.Larry has a BS degree and attended Western Washington University in Industrial Technology and Seattle University in Electrical Engineering.