The Cape Cod Foundation Announces New Board Member Appointments

Three community leaders have recently taken on new roles at The Cape Cod Foundation. Lisa J. Oliver and Paul Houlihan have joined the Board of Directors, and Dr. Sharon Nunes has been appointed Vice Chairman.

LISA J. OLIVER

Lisa J. Oliver is the fifth President and CEO of The Cooperative Bank of Cape Cod.  She is also the first female to assume the role in the Bank’s 96-year history.

Oliver came to the East Coast after a 16-year stay in the Midwest, where she held several senior leadership positions at the Cleveland, Ohio-based KeyBank during her twenty-five years there. As Executive Vice President and Head of Business Banking, she led the company’s $3 billion business banking unit. As President of the Bank’s Greater Cleveland District, she led its extensive philanthropic initiatives and oversaw 85 branch locations and the commercial, business banking and private banking sales teams.

Deeply entrenched in Ohio’s philanthropic community, she served in numerous leadership capacities with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, United Way, and the American Heart Association, among others. She was also Co-Executive Chair of the Young Professionals Key Business Networking Group and the recipient of the prestigious Woman of Achievement award from the YWCA Greater Cleveland for extraordinary career success, community service, leadership, mentoring, and dedication to YWCA’s mission of eliminating racism and empowering women.

PAUL HOULIHAN

Paul Houlihan of Sandwich is one of the movers and shakers behind The Fund for Sandwich, one of the Foundation’s Town Funds. In November, the Fund awarded its inaugural grants to five nonprofits serving the Sandwich community. He also just completed a 6-year term as one of nine Barnstable County Human Rights Commissioners.

Houlihan has extensive experience in organizational management and administration, international negotiations and community-based program development. He has also taught social and economic policy on the university level.

From 2009-2014, he served as principal consultant to Clean Energy Solutions, Inc., a small Cambridge-based energy efficiency consulting firm that provided project management services to the Greater Cincinnati Energy Alliance, The City of Cleveland, the Better Buildings Programs in Jacksonville, Florida and New Orleans, LA and the Atlanta-based Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance.

Prior to that, he served as senior manager and president of The School for Field Studies (SFS), an international field-based, environmental research and community development organization serving indigenous communities in Kenya, Costa Rica, Mexico, Australia and the British West Indies.

Dr. Sharon Nunes

Dr. Sharon Nunes of Falmouth has served on the Foundation’s Board since 2014.  In addition to her recent appointment to the Vice Chairman position, she has taken on the position of  Advisory Committee Chair of The Falmouth Fund of The Cape Cod Foundation for which she has volunteered since 2014.

Nunes, a long-time executive at IBM, worked in several of the company’s businesses before retiring in 2012. During her 28-year tenure there, she used her background in Materials Science and Engineering and her knowledge of Information Technology to help launch two global businesses—Life Sciences (2001) and Big Green Innovations (2006)—which became one of the cornerstones of IBM’s Smarter Plant Program.

While at IBM, Nunes was a leader in the IBM Global Women’s Council and co-chair of its global “Women in Technology” committee. In 2009, she was recognized as one of the “Women Taking the Lead to Save our Planet” and inducted into the Women in Technology International’s Hall of Fame. She also mentored women and early-career employees throughout her career and received IBM’s Fran Allen Mentoring Award in 2004 and was recognized nationally as a “Women of Excellence by the National Association of Female Executives for her impact in mentoring technical women.

“We are fortunate to have Board Members of this caliber,” said Board Chairman Henry R. Holden. “Lisa and Paul join an incredible team of community leaders like Sharon, chosen for their individual expertise and sensitivity to and knowledge of the Cape’s needs. We are so grateful they have volunteered their time and talent to help execute the Foundation’s goals and promote the welfare of our community.”