Carla Javits is the President of REDF. As President, Carla sets REDF's strategy in partnership with the Board of Directors and oversees its operations. Under her leadership, REDF helps to create and grow new businesses to employ very poor people who otherwise are not likely to find or keep a job.
She also oversees REDF's efforts to build the field by broadly sharing the results of its extensive, multi-year effort to measure outcomes that demonstrate the effectiveness of social enterprise in helping people with multiple barriers move into the workforce.
Prior to joining REDF, Carla was with the Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH) for fifteen years, leading it for the last six. By the end of her tenure, CSH had committed nearly $124 million in loans and grants to support the creation of more than 16,000 units of supportive housing that were operational, with 10,500 more units in the pipeline. She has also worked as a policy and budget analyst for the State of California and as Director of Policy and Planning for the San Francisco Department of Social Services. Carla has served on the Board of Directors for The Philanthropic Initiative since 2006. She was appointed to the California Housing Finance Agency Board of Directors in June 2007, and was elected to the board of the Bay Area's regional grant makers association, Northern California Grantmakers, in March 2008. She is on the advisory panel for the American Human Development Project, and is a member of the Workgroup on Social Investing. Carla holds both a Masters of Public Policy and BA from the University of California, Berkeley.