Mark Willis is the Executive Director and a Resident Research Fellow at the NYU Furman Center. Before joining the Center, Mark was a Visiting Scholar at the Ford Foundation, working on research related to community development and the financial services sector. Prior to his time at Ford, Mark spent 19 years at JPMorgan Chase, overseeing its community development programs and products to help strengthen low- and moderate-income communities. Among his many accomplishments there, Mark founded the Chase Community Development Corporation. Before joining Chase, Mark held various positions in economic development and tax policy with the City of New York, including Deputy Commissioner for Development at the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, and was an urban economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Mark teaches Housing and Community Development Policy at NYU's Wagner School and speaks often on urban, housing, and community development affairs. He chairs the Program Planning Committee of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority and a number of other boards involved with housing and community development. He has a B.A. in economics from Yale University, a J.D. from Harvard Law School, and a Ph.D. in urban economics and industrial organization from Yale University.