OUR LEADERSHIP

CEO, Communities Unlimited, Inc.

Ines Polonius has spent more than 30 years advancing economic development in the American South. She has served as Chief Executive Officer of Communities Unlimited, a CDFI working alongside communities in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, and Alabama, since joining the organization in 2014.

She holds an MBA and a master’s in economics from Boston University and a bachelor’s in foreign service from Georgetown University. Ines serves on the boards of RCAP and AEO, and is a 2017 BALLE Fellow and RWJF Interdisciplinary Research Leader.

Principal, Debby Warren Consulting
Adjunct Professor, Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy – Duke University

Debby Warren has spent more than 30 years advancing social and economic justice across the American South, largely through nonprofit leadership. She served as the first Executive Director of both the Southern Rural Development Initiative (SRDI) and the Community Reinvestment Association of North Carolina (CRA-NC), and as Co-Director of the legal services entity that preceded the NC Justice Center.

Warren also taught at Duke University’s Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy, where she developed new courses on nonprofit leadership and community philanthropy.

Director, Office of Environmental Health and Engineering, Cherokee Nation

Billy Hix has worked for the Cherokee Nation for nearly two decades. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Northeastern State University in 1996 and a Master of Science in Industrial Management in 2000.

Hix is a Registered Sanitarian with the State of Oklahoma and the National Environmental Health Association, and holds a Class B Water Operator license, a Water Laboratory license, and a Class C Wastewater license from the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality.

He works closely with federal, state, and local agencies to address water and sewer infrastructure needs across the Cherokee Nation’s 14-county jurisdictional area in northeast Oklahoma.

Executive Director, LOCUS

Deb Markley brings more than 35 years of experience in community economic development to her role as senior vice president of LOCUS Impact Investing, where she manages consulting services for place-focused philanthropic institutions. She also co-founded the Center for Rural Entrepreneurship, a national nonprofit that works alongside communities to build on local assets, business, social, and civic entrepreneurs, to drive economic development.

Markley holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in agricultural economics from Cornell University and a doctorate in the same field from Virginia Tech. Her research has informed academic journals, national policy organizations, and congressional committees.

Attorney at Law, Sprinkle Firm

Max Sprinkle has founded and operated several successful businesses over the course of his entrepreneurial career. He also volunteers with the Bowen Business Law Group, the PLUS Program, the Academic Success Program, the Moot Court Board, and the Mock Trial Team, among others.

He earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and Marketing from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff and attended the University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s Bowen School of Law.

Owner/Consultant, Saloman Torres Soluciones

Saloman Torres was raised in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas, the youngest of eight siblings in a family that migrated for seasonal work, picking crops from the canneries of Wisconsin to the fields of California.

Torres now provides government affairs and commercial development consulting from his office in downtown Harlingen, Texas. He previously served three years as Executive Director of the San Benito (Texas) Economic Development Corporation, nine years as district director in South Texas for Congressman Ruben Hinojosa, and three years on Capitol Hill for Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez and the House Small Business Committee.

Executive Director, BuildUS Fund

Justin Maxson is a philanthropic strategist and advocate for policy and practice that create economic opportunity and climate progress. He serves as Executive Director of BuildUS, following roles as Senior Fellow at the Amalgamated Institute, Deputy Under Secretary at USDA Rural Development, and six years as CEO of the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. Before that, he spent 13 years as President of the Mountain Association for Community Economic Development (now Mountain Association), a CDFI serving eastern Kentucky and Central Appalachia.

Maxson was a founding board member of the Center for Rural Strategies and a yearlong fellow at the Sustainability Institute and the Rockwood Leadership Institute. At the Kentucky governor’s request, he served on the Kentucky Climate Action Planning Committee and the planning committee for Shaping Our Appalachian Region.

He holds a master’s degree from Boston University and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Kentucky, both in anthropology.

Deputy Director, Colorado Energy Office

Principal, DKY Consulting

Donna Kay Yeargan is a native Arkansan, born and raised in Howard County. After graduating from the University of Arkansas, where she was a campus leader, she married and moved to Foreman, Arkansas, becoming active in civic, church, and state affairs. She earned a master’s degree from East Texas State University, now affiliated with Texas A&M.

Yeargan has served on the University of Arkansas Alumni Board of Directors and the Natural State Committee, as Chairman of the State Parks Commission and the Arkansas Natural and Cultural Resources Council, and in numerous other community and civic organizations. She joined newly elected Senator Blanche Lincoln’s staff as Director of Economic Development before being named State Director, overseeing the state operations of Lincoln’s Arkansas offices until January 2011.