Team

Christopher E. Donald was sworn-in as the Executive Director/CEO of the District of Columbia Housing Finance Agency (DCHFA) in March 2021. Mr. Donald served the Agency as the Interim and Acting Executive Director/CEO from January 2020-March 2021. He is responsible for the overall supervision, coordination, and strategic direction of the District of Columbia Housing Finance Agency. Mr. Donald joined the Agency in October 2016 as the Senior Vice President of Multifamily Lending and Neighborhood Investments where he served as part of DCHFA’s senior management team. His primary responsibility was to manage the day-to-day operations of the Multifamily Lending and Neighborhood Investments (formerly Public Finance) department and assist the Executive Director & CEO with the development of multifamily programs, products, polices and strategic planning.

Mr. Donald has over 15 years of experience in real estate finance, community building, development, land entitlement and construction. He’s entitled over 1MM square feet of mixed-income, transit-oriented, amenity-rich housing. Mr. Donald specializes in acquisitions, entitlement, community visioning and deal structuring. He has completed over $1 billion in real estate financing over the course of his career and renovated over 1,000 multifamily units and entitled and underwritten almost 3,500 multifamily units throughout Northern Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia. Mr. Donald has also acquired and programmed commercial space for small local businesses and retailers.

As the Director of Development at the Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing (APAH), Mr. Donald underwrote and structured $60MM in Low Income Housing Tax Credit transactions. Over the last several years he has provided underwriting services to the Office of State Superintendent for Education for the District of Columbia and financed over $300 million in improvements for public charter schools using New Markets Tax Credits, tax exempt bonds and other tools. Mr. Donald began his career in finance at Lehman Brothers in the Municipal Finance Group and underwrote $200MM in revenue bonds for the District of Columbia.

Prior to his tenure at DCHFA, Mr. Donald served as the Principal and Co-Founder of The Leidesdorff Group. The Leidesdorff Group (TLG) is a diversified real estate advisory firm focused on the regeneration of urban communities within the Mid-Atlantic region. As a principal of TLG, Mr. Donald focused on distressed and disinvested urban communities. Mr. Donald serves as the secretary on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Local Housing Finance Agencies (NALHFA) and DCHFA. From 2018-2020 he served on the boards of the African American Real Estate Professionals of D.C. and the Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers (HAND) boards. Mr. Donald is a member of the Urban Land Institute. He is a graduate of Stanford University, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science.

Michael Hentrel has served as the General Counsel for the District of Columbia Housing Finance Agency since 2018.  Mr. Hentrel, a 1992 graduate of Howard University School of Law, previously served as Counsel for the Federal Deposit Corporation (FDIC) where he provided advice, counsel and transactional support regarding the management and disposition of $25 Billion in assets jointly owned by FDIC and private investors. Previously, Mr. Hentrel performed a similar role as Associate General Counsel at Fannie Mae.  During his career, Mr. Hentrel has also been Deputy General Counsel of the National Capitol Revitalization Corporation and an associate at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman.  He is admitted to practice in the District of Columbia and Maryland and is a member of numerous professional and legal organizations.

Mr. Hentrel is a graduate of the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Arts in History and holds a Juris Doctorate, cum laude, from the Howard University School of Law.

Jeff Cooper joined DCHFA in 2017 and brings 20 years of experience in asset management, acquisitions, risk management and real estate investment strategy. As Senior Vice President of Portfolio and Asset Management (PAM), Mr. Cooper is responsible for managing a team of real estate professionals in asset management, construction management and compliance. Jeff’s portfolio experiences total well over $6 billion, with a default ratio of less than .25%.

Prior to his current role, Mr. Cooper served as the Vice President, PAM at DCHFA. Before joining the Agency, he served as Chief of Asset Management for Howard County Housing Commission (HCHC), where he was instrumental in acquisitions, increasing cashflow across the HCHC portfolio, improving asset sustainability and played a key role in negotiating favorable renovation contracts. Mr. Cooper also served as Vice President for Wachovia Multifamily Cap., Inc. where he managed Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac secured assets across the U.S. He received special recognition from both GSE’s for risk management. Mr. Cooper has a successful track record in mitigating and managing various levels of risk. While at Wachovia, he was instrumental in new business, client retention and managing a $2 billion multifamily portfolio.

Career experiences include multifamily/residential management, various phases of mortgage banking/servicing, acquisition and construction monitoring/management and building strong partnerships with various property management firms for the purpose of asset preservation and improving cashflow. Mr. Cooper is most proud of working with smart people throughout his career and playing a role in providing housing.

Mr. Cooper is a member of the Board of Directors of the African American Real Estate Professionals of D.C. and is an active member of Urban Land Institute.  He has earned certifications from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) in multifamily real estate.  Mr. Cooper holds a degree in Business Administration with a concentration in Management from Elizabeth City State University.