Board of Directors and Staff

2020 – 2021 BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Catherine Blinder – President
Department of Consumer Protection
Elected 2019

Katie Burton – Vice President
Elected 2019

Eric Pomroy – Treasurer
OneDigital Health & Benefits
Elected 2019

Jamelia N. Morgan – Secretary
University of Connecticut School of Law
Elected 2019

Earl Stallings
MassMutual
Elected 2017 – 2022

Amber Elliot
North Hartford Partnership—Community Solutions

Elected 2019

Staff

Erin Kemple
Executive Director

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Ms. Kemple has worked with people of color and low-income communities for over three decades. In 1985, she was admitted to legal practice in Massachusetts, where she specialized in representing low income individuals and families with housing and benefits complaints. She then spent 14 years as founder, legal director and executive director of the Housing Discrimination Project, a private fair housing organization serving all of central and western Massachusetts. Since 2003, Ms. Kemple has served as Executive Director of the Connecticut Fair Housing Center. While at the Center, she has advised state and local officials regarding the implementation of policies and plans to overcome impediments to fair housing choice. Ms. Kemple is a graduate of Suffolk University Law School and the College of the Holy Cross.

María Cristina Cuerda
Fair Housing Specialist

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Ms. Cuerda runs fair housing tests, works directly with clients who believe they have been the victims of housing discrimination, and conducts education and outreach regarding fair housing laws. She is particularly interested in using fair housing law and community organizing to overcome barriers faced by people with criminal records when looking for housing. Before joining the Center, Ms. Cuerda worked as a legal services advocate for 20 years concentrating on issues facing undocumented immigrants, farm workers, and people receiving public benefits. At Western Massachusetts Legal Services, she ran a project providing legal assistance to residents of the North End neighborhood of Springfield, the poorest census tract in the state of Massachusetts. A San Francisco native, Ms. Cuerda is a graduate of Smith College.

Fionnuala Darby-Hudgens
Director of Operations

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Ms. Darby-Hudgens joined the center in 2017.

Ms. Darby-Hudgens has pursued fair housing advocacy and research since 2012, when she completed her thesis, Zoned Out: Linking Residential Zoning and Schooling Performance. During her research, she read 169 municipal zoning regulations, and collected and coded over 30 exclusionary land use strategies used across Connecticut. Zoned Out was included in the 2015 Connecticut Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing. In 2017 she began researching Connecticut’s fair housing history. Through the course of the past four years, she has presented Connecticut’s 100 Years of Fair Housing History to hundreds of people and produced three walking tours. Fionnuala earned a B.A. from Trinity College and a MPA from the University of Connecticut.

James Dresser
Fair Housing Specialist

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Mr. Dresser joined the Center in 2014. He runs fair housing tests, works directly with clients who believe they have been the victim of housing discrimination, and conducts outreach and education regarding fair housing laws. Prior to joining the Center, Mr. Dresser worked in Los Angeles with the Coalition for Humane Immigration Rights in Los Angeles (CHIRLA), an immigrants’ rights organization. While with CHIRLA, Mr. Dresser conducted labor tests and analyzed data to investigate issues dealing with national origin discrimination by employers.

Jeff Gentes
Managing Attorney, Fair Lending and Foreclosure Prevention Project

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Mr. Gentes manages the Center’s work on fair lending and foreclosure prevention. He is also a member of the state’s Bench-Bar Foreclosure Committee, the George W. and Sadella D. Crawford Visiting Clinical Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School, and a registered lobbyist. Prior to joining the Center, Mr. Gentes worked at the Homeowner Defense Project of Staten Island Legal Services. Mr. Gentes was raised in Lebanon, Connecticut. He received his B.A. from the University of Connecticut and his J.D. from New York University School of Law.

Pamela Heller
Staff Attorney

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Ms. Heller joined the Center as a foreclosure prevention staff attorney in 2011; she later began taking on fair housing cases as well. Prior to coming to the Center, she worked as a law clerk to the Honorable Ellen Ash Peters and to the Honorable William J. Sullivan at the Connecticut Appellate Court and as a legal research clerk at the Connecticut Superior Court. Ms. Heller has taught as an adjunct faculty member at Elms College in Massachusetts and at the University of St. Joseph in Connecticut. She received a B.A. with honors in Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity from Stanford University, an MSW with a concentration in policy from the University of Connecticut School of Social Work, and a J.D. with honors from the University of Connecticut School of Law.

Salmun Kazerounian
Staff Attorney

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Mr. Kazerounian works with the Center’s fair housing enforcement team to represent the victims of housing discrimination in administrative actions and in state and federal court. He received his B.A. from the University of Connecticut and his law degree from the University of Washington School of Law, where he was a Gates Public Service Law Scholar. Prior to joining the Center’s staff in 2012, Mr. Kazerounian was a staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands, where he specialized in representing rural low-income individuals and community organizations in civil cases.

Greg Kirschner
Legal Director

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Mr. Kirschner litigates and manages the prosecution of fair housing cases filed with administrative agencies and in state and federal court. He received his J.D. from the Georgetown University Law Center and a B.A. in History from the George Washington University. Representative reported decisions include Laflamme v. New Horizons, Inc., 605 F. Supp. 2d 378 (D. Conn. 2009); Gashi v. Grubb & Ellis, et al., 801 F.Supp.2d 12, 16 (D. Conn. 2011); Parris v. Pappas, 844 F.Supp.2d 271, 278 (D. Conn. 2012); Francia v. Mt. Vernon Fire Insurance Co., 2012 WL 1088544 (March 6, 2012 ) (53 Conn. L. Rptr. 687).

Jessica Labrencis
Staff Attorney

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Ms. Labrencis joined the Center as a fair housing enforcement staff attorney in 2014. Prior to joining the Center, Ms. Labrencis was an associate attorney at a law firm in San Diego where she represented employees in discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wrongful termination, and wage and hour cases. She received her B.A. in English from Stonehill College, and her J.D. magna cum laude from California Western School of Law, where she was a member of the Public Service Honors Society.

David Lavery
Staff Attorney

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Mr. Lavery joined the Center in 2016, and litigates fair lending, fair housing, and foreclosure cases. Mr. Lavery’s focus is on identifying and investigating discriminatory lending and housing patterns using quantitative and qualitative data. He received his B.A. in Economics and Finance from Muhlenberg College and his J.D. from Syracuse University cum laude.

Melissa Marichal
Staff Attorney

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Ms. Marichal joined the Connecticut Fair Housing Center as an eviction prevention staff attorney in 2020. Previously, Ms. Marichal was a legal fellow at New Haven Legal Assistance Association, where she practiced in the housing and community economic justice units. She received her B.A. from Columbia University and her J.D. from Yale Law School.

Loraine Martinez Bellamy
Staff Attorney

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Ms. Martinez came to the Center as a foreclosure prevention staff attorney in 2012. Before joining the Center, she served as an attorney advisor for the Social Security Administration, Office of Appellate Operations in Washington, D.C. Ms. Martinez received a B.S. with honors in Management and International Business from the University of Connecticut and a J.D. from the University of Maryland School of Law. While in law school, she interned with the Community Law Center in Baltimore.

Letty Ortiz
Administrative Assistant & Intake Specialist

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For more than a decade, Ms. Ortiz has been responsible for coordinating the Center’s administrative needs, completing intakes with new clients in English and Spanish, and assisting the fair housing and fair lending staff with their cases, including provision of translation services. She also assists with event planning and helps staff schedule education and outreach events.

Sarah White
Staff Attorney

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Ms. White joined the Center’s fair lending and foreclosure prevention program in 2012. Previously, she was a staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands. Ms. White received her B.A. from Hendrix College and her M.A. and J.D. from the University of Washington. She was the recipient of the National Lawyers Guild’s C. B. King award in 2010 for her social justice efforts.

Rashida Rattray
Education and Outreach Coordinator

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Ms. Rattray joined the center in 2020 as their Education and Outreach Coordinator. Rashida’s professional experience is rooted in foreclosure prevention and mitigation counseling as well as legal administration. In her previous work as a housing counselor, Rashida assisted over 40 families gaining positive outcomes while going through foreclosure. She also has a strong background in community engagement that was fostered by her work for the City of Waterbury. At the Center, Rashida facilitates outreach to a multitude of different stakeholders by planning and executing fair housing trainings, maintaining the Center’s social media channels, and brainstorming new ways to connect with the people we serve. She is actively pursuing her passion for advocating for people in all she does.

Contact us at (860) 247-4400 or info@ctfairhousing.org.

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