The Boston Globe On NACA CEO Bruce Marks

The Boston Globe recently ran a story on their 2007 Bostonian of the Year, consumer advocate / housing activist Bruce Marks, the founder and chief executive officer of the nonprofit Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America, or NACA. The following excerpts provide a prelude for the rest of the story:

• [I]f you should find yourself up against one of the nation's most powerful banks, feeling abused by a maddening loop of automated messages, threatening letters, and buck-passing paper pushers, if you should feel powerless to reassure your little daughter when she tearfully asks you if you're going to lose the only home she's ever known, well then, there's nobody you'd want in your corner more than Bruce Marks. And sadly, a whole lot of desperate people had to turn to Marks for help this year, and a whole lot more will need his emergency services in the year ahead.

One veteran banking executive describes Marks as follows:

• "It's almost as if Bruce has two personalities. There's the advocate and bomb thrower, which has made many people in banking wary of him. But behind that, there's this incredibly effective, disciplined businessperson."

For more, see Guarding the House (Wall Street made billions off the backs of homeowners. But when the mortgage crisis blew up, a pit bull named Bruce Marks stood up for the Average Joes and, incredibly, got some of the biggest banks to bend).