Changemaker: Roy Alexander
Roy Alexander was born to teenage parents on the island nation of Grenada, the firstborn of six children. His parents, both of whom had the equivalent of a fifth-grade education, were hardworking and dedicated to seeing their children thrive, but Roy and his family grappled with poverty, particularly in his younger years.
“Our initial home had no running water or electricity, and we had to carry the water we needed in buckets on our heads from the nearest public source,” Roy recalled. “I remember also how our eyes would burn as we would try to read by the light of kerosene lamps at night.”
By the time Roy prepared to enter high school, his mother was working as a maid for a family in one of the island’s wealthier and thriving neighborhoods. One day while walking home, she saw a sign for a plot of land for sale in the area. When she called to inquire about the cost to purchase, the agent refused to connect her with the landowner. Determined to find a home that would support her growing children and their education, she persisted, eventually finding a way to contact the landowner directly.
“My mom explained that her son was entering high school,” Roy recalled. “Her story moved the owner, and they decided to sell a quarter of an acre of land to my family on which we could build a home.”
He recalled how his father would continually impress upon him and his siblings the importance of working hard to obtain an education. He would even create math homework assignments for Roy to complete. Roy was the first in his family and neighborhood to go to high school. His success in school was due, in part, to spending his teenage years in a home with running water, electricity and his own room in this fledging area.
“That housing and that help that we received enabled us to get a home we could afford, and we as children, all of us, were able to grow up and become something,” Roy explained.
By the time he’d completed high school, Roy had emerged as a talented cricket player. In 1970, following his high school graduation, Roy had the opportunity to compete on the Grenada cricket team. This could have ultimately landed him a spot on the West Indies Team, a professional club comprised of the top players across a handful of countries and territories in the Caribbean. He weighed this invitation carefully against the opportunity to pursue a college education in the United States.
“I had a friend in Grenada who lived in the area of our new home and who planned to go to Florida to study to become a Certified Public Accountant (CPA),” Roy recalled. “I said, ‘What is that?’ When he described accounting and the degree he was pursuing, I said, ‘I think I’m going to do that too.”
Roy moved to the United States and received a bachelor’s degree in accounting from MSU Denver, having chosen Denver because his great aunt and her children lived in the area, close to transportation and downtown. He obtained his CPA license and secured his first job out of college at Deloitte, where he would spend more than a decade working as an auditor.
Later, seeking a change of pace and a new career direction, Roy and a business partner also a CPA, whom he had once interviewed at Florida A&M on behalf of Deloitte, acquired a franchise that sold fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies at Westminster Mall. About two years into his new business venture, he received a call from Penfield Tate, who was serving on the CHFA Board.
“He left me a message on my answering machine and explained that there was a job opening for an Assistant Director of Finance at CHFA,” Roy recalled. “I became enamored by the idea of working at CHFA because of its mission. I loved the idea that I would be helping people get housing every day.”
Roy was hired in late 1988 as CHFA’s Assistant Director of Finance and assumed the role of Director of Finance a little more than a year later. Roy recalls his close working relationship with CHFA’s then Executive Director David Herlinger, as well as Herlinger’s love of golf.
“One day, Dave called me from his office after work and he told me that he had a tee time at a local course and invited me to join him,” recalled Roy. “I said to him, ‘That’s so nice of you, but I don’t know how to play the game.’ He called again two weeks later, and I had to turn him down again. Then, I met a friend who was a bank manager trying to gather a half dozen people wanting to get golf lessons, and I signed up for those lessons. Sure enough, it was not long before I got a third call from Dave inviting me out to play golf, and this time I told him yes.”
When it came time for Herlinger to retire, he voiced his support for Roy to lead CHFA through its next chapter. In the Fall of 2000, CHFA’s Board of Directors appointed Roy as its third Executive Director and CEO, a role he would hold until the end of 2009.
Under Roy’s leadership, CHFA took strides to modernize and grow the funding side of its business model to enable the continuous flow of funding for mortgage loans. CHFA launched its Colorado Growth and Revitalization Fund to administer New Markets Tax Credits, and established the chfareach industry education program for residents and owners of affordable housing. Additionally, CHFA opened its first office outside of Denver on the Western Slope.
“During my term, some CHFA employees, including Dave Herlinger and myself, used to get together annually with CHFA business partners for a golf tournament for fun, camaraderie and appreciation,” Roy recalled. “As the popularity of this tournament grew, we decided to transform this into a signature CHFA event to raise funds to benefit nonprofit charities that have a nexus to affordable housing.”
In 2004, CHFA held its first annual golf tournament to benefit a nonprofit organization, an event that would ultimately be named after the late David W. Herlinger to honor his legacy and his love for the game of golf.
“Housing enabled me to become something,” said Roy. “Housing provides a foundation for people and an opportunity to succeed, and my story was a natural fit for my work at CHFA. I also carried with me to CHFA the idea of continuous improvement that was instilled in me by my parents. They always reminded us that if we worked hard, we could always aspire to something better.”
Roy remains proud of CHFA, his CHFA team, and his legacy there. He continues to serve in the affordable housing space as an independent director of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Topeka, where he is Vice Chair as well as the Chair of its mission and governance committee.