Chris Welsh - President

Scott Wallace - Vice President

Scott Woodward - Secretary/Treasurer

Scott Woodward is a Principal with UHY Advisors and UHY LLP, a licensed CPA firm, serving clients in the Audit and Transaction Services groups. UHY Advisors and UHY LLP are independent U.S. members of UHY International Limted, providing global resources in more than 75 countries. Mr. Woodward is a licensed CPA in Texas and New York and provides financial audit expertise for both public and privately held companies as well as financial due diligence with respect to mergers and acquisitions. Before joining UHY in 2008, Mr. Woodward served in the audit and advisory practices of Arthur Andersen, KPMG, and Grant Thornton. Mr. Woodward is a member of the Association for Corporate Growth, The Real Estate Council, Commercial Finance Association, AICPA and the Texas Society of CPAs. Mr. Woodward graduated from Texas A & M University with a MS and BBA in Accounting.

LaRee Bryant - Chapter Coordinator

LaRee Bryant has thirty years of experience in administrative services and organization coordination, a business she thoroughly enjoys.  In her "other life," LaRee is the author of seven New York-published novels and two how-two books.  She is currently working on a series of cozy mystery novels.

Joseph Acosta, Looper Reed & McGraw

Joseph is a Member in the Bankruptcy and Restructuring Group at Looper Reed & McGraw, P.C., a Texas-based, full-service law firm with approximately 100 attorneys practicing throughout the State.  Joseph has been involved as debtor’s counsel in some of the largest corporate restructurings in the United States and also has served as counsel to committees, trustees, lenders and investors in bankruptcy settings.  Joseph is Board Certified in Business Bankruptcy by the American Board of Certification and actively speaks and writes on bankruptcy-related topics.  He received his Bachelors Degree from Emory University and his J.D. from the University of Houston Law Center.

Tony Banks, Hein & Associates, LLP

Steve Bellah, Clear Thinking Group, LLC

Steven R. Bellah has over thirty years of commercial finance, managerial and consulting experience. He has been involved with complex transactions such as management buyouts, leveraged buyouts, turnarounds, debtor-in-possession financing, changes of control and special situations. Mr. Bellah’s experience includes intensive work in working capital management, cash-flow management, profitability analysis, asset-based lending, subordinated capital, securitizations, leasing and factoring.

Mr. Bellah has worked with all facets of commercial finance, ranging from new business origination to loan work-outs. Before joining Clear Thinking Group, Mr. Bellah was a Senior Associate with a financial and operational consulting firm primarily involved in on-site, client projects at distressed companies involving operational challenges, financial restructuring, or forensic investigations. Prior to that, Mr. Bellah was a Director of Silver Spring Securities, a registered broker-dealer which was affiliated with a billion dollar specialty finance fund focusing on asset-based lending and private equity investments. Mr. Bellah held a Senior Vice President/Business Development Officer position at Wells Fargo Retail Finance, and was a Division Manager at Wells Fargo Business Credit. He was also Managing Director and Region Manager for GE Capital’s Commercial Finance division, where he directed new business development as well as credit and operations functions. Mr. Bellah was Vice President and Region Manager for The CIT Group/Business Credit and founded CIT’s Southwest Region.

Frank Bonet, PNC

Lisa Bulkley, Westlake Securities

Lisa Bulkley serves as Director of Acquisition Services for Westlake Securities, LLC, a Texas-based investment banking firm with offices in Dallas, Austin, Houston and Lafayette.  Westlake works with middle market companies that have $25 million to $1.0 billion in revenue, providing merger and acquisition advisory, recapitalizations, equity capital formation, debt placement, fairness opinions and valuations.  Westlake’s clients include family-owned businesses, privately held companies, private equity funds and publicly traded companies.  Westlake is a member of FINRA and SIPC.

Derek Dunn, Frost Capital

Derek Dunn is a Vice President of Business Development for Frost Capital Group, a division of Frost Bank, which provides working capital loans and factoring to companies seeking innovative financing not generally available through traditional sources.  Prior to joining Frost Capital three years ago, Derek was a financial planner in Denver and Dallas.  In addition to The Commercial Finance Association, Derek is a board member of The Finance Forum, and involved in the Turnaround Management Association..  Derek earned a bachelors degree from Oklahoma State University.

Kim Grant, Gulf Coast Bank

Kim Grant joined Gulf Coast Business Credit, headquartered in New Orleans, in 2009 to open up their Dallas office. She currently serves as Vice President and focuses on business development in Texas and Oklahoma.  Prior to joining Gulf Coast, Ms. Grant was Vice President of Sales & Marketing at Allied Capital Partners, where she began her career in finance in 1999. In 2001, Ms. Grant started The Finance Forum, a financial networking group focused on funding small and medium sized businesses, and remained on the Board of Directors for 5 years. Ms. Grant is currently an active member of The Women’s Finance Exchange, Turnaround Management Association, and The Finance Forum. She is personally very actively involved in the Junior League of Plano as the Chair of Lone Star Links, a major fundraising golf event that supports 13 of Collin County’s community projects.  Ms. Grant earned her BS in Biomedical Science at Texas A&M University.

Elizabeth Hastings, Republic Business Credit, LLC

Elizabeth Hastings is currently at Republic Business Credit, LLC as a Senior Vice President, Regional Sales Manager. Elizabeth brings over fifteen years of dedicated financial services experience to her position with Republic Business Credit. Prior to joining Republic, Ms. Hastings served as SVP of Business Development for FGI and as South West Regional Vice President for Presidential Financial. Before working for Presidential Ms. Hastings had previously been the Regional Director of Business Development for Medical Capital, a firm specializing in healthcare finance. Ms. Hastings has also been an officer with Bank One as wells as serving as an Investment and Financial Consultant with Prudential Securities.

Anthony Herrera, Patton Boggs, LLP

G. Dulany Howland, Howland Advisory

Ella Nguyen, Pepperwood Partners

Ella Nguyen is a lead analyst at Pepperwood Partners. Prior to joining Pepperwood, Ms. Nguyen worked at JPMorgan Chase with the Broker/Dealers Security Services group. Before JPMorgan, Ms. Nguyen worked with the research department at the University of Texas at Dallas where she familiarized herself with financial and statistical research best practices and platforms. She was also involved in the creation and establishment of UT Dallas’ first ever student managed investment fund. Ms. Nguyen holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics and Finance from the University of Texas at Dallas where she was awarded a full scholarship and graduated summa cum laude.

Prashant Nisar, Grant Thornton

Prashant Nisar is a manager with the National Professional Standards Group in the Grant Thornton Dallas office and has more than ten years of public accounting experience. He specializes in SEC financial reporting, provide advice on complex accounting matters, and help companies during the IPO process and Sarbanes-Oxley attestation. He has experience with and knowledge of convergence to IFRS/US GAAP, specifically relating to the preparation of financial statements or the audit of those financial statements. He also has significant experience with audits of financial institutions and financial services, oil and gas and technology industries. Prashant obtained a Bachelor of Commerce and a Masters degree in Accounting from University of Mumbai, India. He is a Certified Public Accountant and a Chartered Accountant from India. He is a member of American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and actively involved with Dallas Society of CPA and Young Professionals with Dallas Regional Chamber.

Andrew Pendleton, Grant Thornton

Caroline Akers Peterson, Looper Reed & McGraw

Heather Thomas, Robert Half Companies

Heather joined Management Resources a Robert Half Company in 2006 as the Division Metro Market Manager. Management Resources provides value to clients by delivering experienced resources on interim and project basis with a primary focus on the office of the CFO.

Mrs. Thomas is a 14 year veteran of the financial services industry where she has held roles in business development and consulting. Mrs. Thomas began her career as a consultant at Carreker where she specialized in cash management and logistic services. After Carreker, Heathers' career lead her to business development management roles for leading financial services companies such as Citibank, American Express, and US Bank where she consulted on spend management, payment automation, and treasury management solutions. Heather received her BBA in Finance from the University of Texas.

John Willding, Strasburger