Kentucky Housing Corporation Recognizes Outstanding Leaders, Disaster Response at Annual Conference

FRANKFORT, Kentucky — Known in affordable housing circles as brilliant, genuine, and incredibly kind, Myron Agnew was posthumously awarded the Dorothy J. Williams Lifetime Achievement Award today at the Kentucky Affordable Housing Conference. His daughter, Victoria Agnew Benson, and Kevin Smith of Community Ventures Corporation, accepted the honor on his behalf.

Agnew’s award was one of several given at the Housing Innovation Awards ceremony, where Kentucky Housing Corporation (KHC) honors outstanding individuals and partners who are advancing affordable housing and housing opportunities throughout the state.

Agnew dedicated his life to helping make the dream of affordable housing a reality for Kentuckians.

He came to Kentucky in 1998 to be the assistant farm manager for Highland Farms in Paris, Kentucky, but soon found a home as director of property management at Community Ventures Corporation, where, during a distinguished 20-year career, he played a pivotal role in the development of several landmark projects, including The Artist’s Village in Lexington, which received the 2022 Urban Innovation Award from Downtown Lexington Partnership, and two projects in Louisville’s west end: the Cedar Street custom-home affordable neighborhood and Chef Space, an incubator for emerging food businesses. While director/manager of the CHDO HOME fund program, Agnew was directly responsible for overseeing 146 projects across 28 counties.

Among the other recipients were William E. Summers  V, a 28-year veteran of the banking industry and former Chairman of the KHC Board of Directors. He received the Mae Street Kidd Public Service Award, named for KHC’s founder, state Rep. Mae Street Kidd.

Summers V started his career as a teller at Great Financial Bank in 1995 and worked his way up through the ranks of the industry at various banks — Central Bank, BB&T, and Old National — to become Senior Vice President/Chief Community Development Officer at Republic Bank in Louisville, where he oversees their corporate community engagement and philanthropic efforts.

In his role with the West End Opportunity Partnership, he is working to bring investment into West Louisville in the same way he helped bring investment into the downtown corridor with his work on the Louisville Arena Authority.

Jim Statler, KHC’s chief financial officer and deputy director of finance and investments, was awarded the Lynn Luallen Innovation Award for advancing affordable housing landscape in Kentucky.

He joined KHC as a loan servicing process analyst in 2011 on the heels of the Great Recession, was quickly promoted twice, and put KHC back on a stable financial path, growing the loan portfolio from 21,058 loans ($1.6 billion) in 2014 to 29,343 ($2.8 billion) in 2020 and reducing the delinquency ratio from 17% in 2011 to 2.27% in 2018. Under his leadership, KHC helped over 35,000 Kentuckians finance over $4.6 billion dollars of home purchases and funded over $151 million in down payment assistance.

Statler also oversaw the Homeowner Assistance Fund (HOAF), which helped 1,669 households avoid foreclosure with a total of $22.7 million paid in assistance during the pandemic.

Before joining KHC, Statler worked in various roles, including CPA, CFO, and executive vice president for companies in the home finance industry.

In addition, KHC honored Special Recognition awards were given to seven organizations for their collaborative and compassionate work to keep Kentuckians housed during the natural disasters that struck the Commonwealth in 2021 and 2022:

• Community Ventures Corporation
• Fahe
• Habitat for Humanity Bowling Green / Warren County
• Habitat for Humanity Pennyrile Region
• HOMES, Inc.
• Housing Development Alliance
• Kentucky Habitat for Humanity

The awards presentation concluded the two-day conference at which nearly 600 affordable housing professionals gathered for three keynotes and more than 40 sessions.