Marla Bilonick is NALCAB’s president and CEO and is CEO of NALCAB’s subsidiary asset management company Escalera Community Investments. Bilonick brings more than 20 years of expertise in small business development, community-based financial services, and international aid, with an emphasis on Latin America and the US Latino population. Before joining NALCAB, she was executive director of the Latino Economic Development Center (LEDC) in Washington, DC. She also served as a NALCAB board member from 2016 to 2020. In 2021, President Biden appointed Bilonick to serve on the US Treasury’s CDFI Fund Community Development Advisory Board and is the board’s first Latinx and second female chair. Bilonick received her BA in political science from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and her MA in international economics and Latin American studies from Johns Hopkins University. Before her tenure at LEDC, Bilonick worked for DAI, managing multimillion-dollar international development contract opportunities funded by USAID and other donor agencies. She also directed Seedco’s Upper Manhattan Business Solutions Center. In addition, Bilonick helped Seedco develop and implement its long-term small business services approach after it was chosen to participate in the city’s September 11, 2001, small business crisis response. She is a board member of the Opportunity Finance Network (OFN), the National Housing Trust, and Self Help Ventures Fund and is a founding member of the National League of Minority Voters’ board. She is a former Aspen Institute Emerging Leaders in Microbusiness-ELM2 Fellow and a graduate of the Citi/OFN Leadership Program for Opportunity Finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Bilonick serves on Capital One’s Community Advisory Council and was an adviser to Wells Fargo’s regional “Where We Live” initiative. She was named to the National Small Business Association-NSBA’s Leadership Council in 2021 and advises the US Small Business Administration.