PBN Leaders & Achievers Awards 2025
CARLA DESTEFANO
Stop Wasting Abandoned Property Inc. Executive director
CARLA DESTEFANO’S EARLY CAREER zigged and zagged. Originally, she thought she’d be a teacher but then decided that wasn’t for her.
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It was the 1970s, and Boston College’s business school had just begun admitting women with a declared major; DeStefano was in the first class.
After graduating with a finance degree, she worked for a tax preparer and consultant, then did project cost accounting for her father’s for-profit construction company.
Eventually, she moved on to roles at a couple of Boston companies, managing Rhode Island high-end properties.
In 1993, she did an about face, taking on the job of executive director of Stop Wasting Abandoned Property Inc. – or SWAP – a Providence-based nonprofit community development corporation that provides affordable housing for low- and moderate-income Rhode Islanders.
Affordable housing is one of the state’s most challenging issues. DeStefano, with her background in for-profit real estate, applies what she’s learned to the nonprofit world. Her role at SWAP, which includes acquisition, finance, construction and management, among other things, was right up her alley.
Over the years, SWAP has invested $200 million in affordable rental housing, residential home sales, and commercial and community space. That translates to the sale of more than 200 new affordable houses, 700 new or renovated apartments, and the creation of more than 22,000 square feet of neighborhood commercial and community space.
“Development is development,” she said. “It’s just the zeros that make the difference. At the end of the day, it’s about making the numbers work.”
Among SWAP’s success stories are its investment in buildings along a stretch of Broad Street in Providence’s Trinity Square neighborhood. This once-dilapidated area now consists of shops, apartments, restaurants and community space for a range of income levels. And, more recently, 2 Hammett Court, a Jamestown housing project SWAP co-partnered with, resulting in commercial space with 12 affordable and accessible apartments.
DeStefano has confronted plenty of red tape in trying to get projects off the ground. Her advice?
“Ignore the bureaucracy. If the answer is no, just keep going,” she said.
