As the CEO of Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), Michael T. Pugh has become a force to be reckoned with regarding affordable housing solutions. LISC is a non-profit organization birthed by the Ford Foundation in 1979, though Pugh only took over as CEO in 2023. But his activist career had already been going on for a long time, beginning with the gig he held before LISC, helming Carver Bank, the largest black-owned bank in the U.S. By the time he left there, he’d made sure that minority- and women-owned businesses had more access to capital. He has an excellent record, but one he’s already eclipsing at LISC, where he leads a team that has already built over 18,000 affordable homes and about 1.2 million square feet of community space. For perspective, that’s up from just under 7,000 units the year before. That makes him an established force for affordable housing in the U.S. and a well-deserved member of the Worthy 100.
