SENIOR LEADERSHIP

   



DEPARTMENTAL STAFF

Tom Merkel
President/ Executive Director
With over 36 years of experience in the mortgage, financial, and banking sectors, Tom has served as The IMPACT! Group's President since 2008. Prior to his work at IMPACT!, Tom was Senior Vice President of Sales for G.E. Money Bank for almost 10 years. Prior to that, his work experience has included serving as President/CEO of Pinnacle Credit Union in Atlanta, and as an Area Manager for CUNA Mutual in financial insurance,. He has also served both the City of Norcross and the City of Berkeley Lake on their Planning and Zoning Commissions. Tom currently serves as President of Board of Director of The Georgia Real Estate Fraud Prevention and Awareness Coalition (GREFPAC) and is on the Board of Directors of The Gwinnett Coalition for Health and Human Services. He has given priority to developing permanent solutions to our community's housing challenges through the creation of sustainable private and public partnerships with the nonprofit housing assistance sector.  Tom is also a member of a number of collaborative task forces that address the housing challenges in both Gwinnett County and Metro Atlanta.

Anthony Mitchell
IMPACT! HomeOwnership Center Director
Anthony oversees all homeowner, homebuyer, and foreclosure prevention services offered by IMPACT!. Under his leadership, IMPACT!'s HomeOwnership Center has become one of Atlanta's most prominent foreclosure prevention and homebuyer education providers, receiving both local and national media attention. Moreover, Anthony has successfully grown IMPACT!'s home counseling programs at a time of stressed donor giving. He has previously served as Director of Community Development for Panama City, Florida and was Housing Program Supervisor for DeKalb County, Georgia. While at IMPACT!, Anthony has helped pioneer a number of novel private-public-nonprofit initiatives to better improve the lives of all Georgia homeowners.




Alice Ramsey
IMPACT! Transitional Housing Director
With over 15 years of promoting client achievement at IMPACT!, Alice has overseen the massive growth and success of IMPACT!'s direct assistance work with homeless families. During the last two decades, Alice has expanded IMPACT!'s work from providing temporary emergency shelter for families to providing longer-term transitional housing with intensive case management, giving families the tools to better address the underlying causes of their homelessness. Today, Alice's key understanding of local community resources and client psyche have allowed her program to achieve a 92 percent success rate in keeping clients in sustainable housing solutions after they leave the program.



IMPACT! HomeOwnership Center
Anthony Mitchell, Director
Jannette Heron, Housing Counselor
Brigitte Bowser, Housing Counselor
Joselyn Torres, Education Coordinator


IMPACT! Transitional Housing
Alice Ramsey, Director
Phoebe Buckley-McNair, MSW, Senior Case Manager
Avis Lucas, Case Manager


Operations                                     
Sandy Burns, Operations Manager        
Peggy Henry, Accounting Manager