# Employees’ Retirement Fund of the City of Dallas Employees’ Retirement Fund of the City of Dallas is a Pension Fund based in Dallas, United States. ## Overview - **Organization type:** Pension Fund - **Headquarters:** Dallas, United States - **Region:** North America - **Address:** Dallas, TX, United States - **Founded:** 1944 - **Assets under management:** $3.5B - $4.5B (Altss estimate) - **Website:** dallaserf.org ## Regulatory record - **Reports private funds:** No ## About Founded in 1944 by the City of Dallas, the Employees’ Retirement Fund provides defined-benefit retirement, disability, and death benefits to municipal workers. A seven-member Board of Trustees governs the plan, with Henry Talavera as Chair and T. Dupree Scovell of Woodbine Development Corp. serving as a Trustee. Cheryl Alston joined in 2004 as Executive Director and CIO, building an investment office that diversified the pension’s public-markets-heavy legacy into private equity, real assets, and credit strategies before her departure in early 2025. Investment strategy blends direct co-investments, fund commitments, and secondaries across a deliberately broad mandate. Real estate is the plan’s heaviest private tilt — the portfolio carries dedicated sleeves in commercial and mixed-use via funds from AEW, Invesco, Heitman, Brasa Capital, and Long Wharf Capital, alongside direct co-investments like AEW PIX Oakland Park in Florida. Private equity exposure spans buyout, growth, venture, and special situations. The fund also maintains allocations to distressed debt, mezzanine, and natural resources, plus a separate public real-assets bucket that includes energy MLPs and a global listed infrastructure portfolio. Cheryl Alston ran the office for 21 years, also serving on the boards of Globe Life and CHRISTUS Health’s investment committee. Her April 2025 departure initiated a leadership transition: Deputy Executive Director David Etheridge was elevated to Executive Director, while Natalie Jenkins Sorrell assumed the CIO role. The team operates exclusively from Dallas and participates in industry networks including the National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems (NCPERS) and the Texas Association of Public Employee Retirement Systems (TEXPERS), giving it consistent peer-level sourcing intelligence on managers and co-investment opportunities. The fund’s architecture departs from many municipal plans its size. Rather than relying predominantly on consultants, Dallas ERF maintains an in-house investment staff that directly accesses co-investment and secondaries pipelines. Combined with the board’s ties to local commercial real estate operators like Woodbine Development, this creates a lean, proximity-informed model that blurs the line between a public pension and an opportunistic family-backed allocator. ## Sectors - Real Estate - Private Credit - Secondaries & Special Situations - Infrastructure - Hedge Funds - Venture (General) ## People - Cheryl D. Alston — Executive Director and CIO (2004-2025) - Natalie J. Jenkins Sorrell — Chief Investment Officer - David K. Etheridge — Executive Director (as of April 2025) - Henry Talavera — Board Chair - T. Dupree Scovell — Trustee, Board of Trustees ## Questions ### Who runs investment decisions at the Dallas Employees' Retirement Fund? Natalie J. Jenkins Sorrell is the Chief Investment Officer, appointed alongside the elevation of David Etheridge to Executive Director in April 2025. The pair succeeded Cheryl Alston, who had served as both Executive Director and CIO since 2004. Day-to-day portfolio management is handled in-house, with the seven-member Board of Trustees providing oversight and approving allocation shifts. ### How does Dallas ERF source private-market deal flow? The fund uses its internal investment team to source direct co-investments and secondaries, bypassing full reliance on traditional consultants. Board connections — notably Trustee T. Dupree Scovell’s role at Woodbine Development — and memberships in NCPERS and TEXPERS provide additional manager and co-investment sourcing channels. This peer network and local real estate operator relationships give the fund direct visibility into deal flow that many municipal plans outsource entirely. ### What is Dallas ERF's exposure to real estate? Real estate is the pension's most concentrated private-markets exposure. Holdings span commercial and mixed-use fund commitments with AEW, Invesco, Heitman, Brasa Capital, and Long Wharf Capital, plus direct co-investments such as AEW PIX Oakland Park in Florida. The fund also participates in residential impact strategies via Affiliated Housing Impact Fund II and maintains separate global listed infrastructure and energy MLP sleeves alongside the direct real property portfolio. ### How does the governance structure differ from other Texas municipal pensions? Dallas ERF operates with an in-house CIO and investment staff managing portfolio execution directly, which is less common among Texas municipal plans that rely heavily on consultant-led manager selection. The plan sponsor, City of Dallas, appoints the seven-member Board of Trustees, and board members have direct ties to local real estate and corporate entities — a depth of operator proximity not universally present in comparable public funds. ### What happened during the leadership transition in 2025? Cheryl Alston, who had served as Executive Director and CIO since 2004, exited in early 2025. David Etheridge, previously Deputy Executive Director, became Executive Director, and Natalie Jenkins Sorrell assumed the CIO role. The transition marked the end of a 21-year tenure that reshaped the fund's portfolio toward direct private-markets investing. ## Related profiles - [City of Hope](https://altss.com/profile/city-of-hope) - [City of Phoenix Employees' Retirement System](https://altss.com/profile/city-of-phoenix-employees-retirement-system) --- Last updated: 2026-06-03T20:00:00.000Z Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/employees-retirement-fund-of-the-city-of-dallas Maintained by Altss — https://altss.com — methodology: https://altss.com/methodology