Mark Colón is President of the Office of Housing Preservation at NY State Homes & Community Renewal (HCR). In this capacity, Mr. Colón has overseen one of the largest, most diverse affordable housing portfolios in the country, with more than 450,000 units in 3,200 developments across New York State. Previously, Colón served as HCR’s acting “Disaster Recovery” Counsel, helping to lead New York’s post-Hurricane Sandy housing recovery efforts, by designing policies for the award of more than $4B in federal, state and privately-sourced relief funding. Prior to his government service, Mr. Colón practiced law at Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett and Dechert LLP. Mark graduated magna cum laude from Hunter College/CUNY and received his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he served as Managing Editor of the Yale Law & Policy Review. Following law school, Mark clerked for the Honorable Julio M. Fuentes, the first Hispanic justice in the history of the Third Circuit, U.S. Court of Appeals. Colón is currently the Chairperson of El Puente de Williamsburg and a board member of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). Colón is a native New Yorker and currently lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Gina Kim, and their 14-year old son.