Shaping the Future - Milken Institute

panelists
Lisa Davis is Program Officer at the Ford Foundation, focusing on its investments in quality housing and on planning
and land use innovations in U.S. metropolitan regions. Before joining the Ford Foundation in 2009, Davis spent more
than a decade in both nonprofit and private-sector organizations to improve housing and economic conditions in
low-income communities. She was vice president and project executive at the New Boston Fund, a private real estate
investment management firm. Prior to New Boston, Davis was director of development for the Codman Square
Neighborhood Development Corp. and director of housing and development for the Asian Community Development
Corp. In both positions, she oversaw real estate, lending and community development departments and organized
neighborhood coalitions to change public policy. Davis holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Texas, Austin,
and a master’s degree in real estate development and city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Barbara Day is the Acting Vice President of Investment Funds of the Overseas Private Investment Corp., an
independent federal agency whose mission is to mobilize and facilitate the participation of U.S. private capital and
skills in the economic and social development of less developed countries and areas, and countries in transition from
nonmarket to market economies. OPIC supports qualifying projects and investment funds for new and expanding
business enterprises in more than 150 countries in the emerging markets. Previously, Day was legal counsel to OPIC’s
investment funds group. Before joining OPIC in 2000, she was a partner with the law firm Zuckerman Spaeder LLP
in Washington, D.C., and practiced law in San Francisco. Day received law degrees from Georgetown University Law
School (LL.M international and comparative law) and the University of Notre Dame.
Roger Dean has been Chief Financial Officer of Axcess Financial since 2004. Prior to Axcess, Dean was at Fifth Third
Bancorp, most recently as senior vice president of finance. Starting as Bancorp controller in 1993, Dean built and led
additional functions including forecasting, planning, management reporting, financial information technology, investor
relations, and mergers and acquisitions. Previously he spent nine years at Deloitte, including a two-year development
assignment in the firm’s national office and service to major clients such as Procter & Gamble and AK Steel. Dean is a
certified public accountant (inactive) and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the Ohio
Society of Certified Public Accountants and Financial Executives International. He received a B.S. in accounting from
Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.
Joseph Dear is Chief Investment Officer of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS). He
oversees all asset classes in which CalPERS invests, including domestic and international equity, Treasury and agency
debt, high-yield bonds, mortgage-backed securities, collateralized debt obligations, real estate, corporate governance,
currency overlay, securities lending, venture capital, leveraged buyouts and hedge funds. Dear is responsible for
the strategic plan for the CalPERS Investment Office, including tactical asset allocation, risk management, business
development, budget authority, new investment programs, trading technology, staffing and back-office operations.
He joined CalPERS in 2009, after serving as executive director for the Washington State Investment Board. In this role,
he oversaw a staff of 73 to implement the board’s investment policy decisions. He was responsible for more than $67.6
billion within 38 funds. Dear received a B.A. in political economy from The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash.
Neil DeFeo is CEO of Sun Products Corp., which he founded with Vestar Capital Partners by merging the laundry
business of Unilever N.A. with Huish Detergents Inc. Before creating Sun, DeFeo was president, CEO and later chairman
of Playtex Products, where he tripled shareholder equity in three years. Prior to Playtex, he was chairman, president and
CEO of Remington Products. DeFeo began his professional career with Procter & Gamble, holding positions of increasing
responsibility over a 25-year period. He then served as group vice president of U.S. operations for the Clorox Company. He
has served on the boards of several public and private companies and industry associations and has been active in many
nonprofits, including United Way and the March of Dimes. He currently sits on the Advisory Board of The International
Crisis Group and the board of Manhattan College, where he received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering.
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