By Mary Donnell, Program Manager, Michigan Good Food Fund
The grocery business is more competitive than ever. Even in normal times, much of the market share is taken up by the big-box players. But in the face of an unprecedented pandemic, local, independent grocers are focusing more deliberately on serving their communities, going out of their way to provide the goods that customers that they often know by name need. These grocers continue to fill an important niche in the landscape, often serving communities that do not see much investment from national chains with top-notch customer service and a focus on community development and local food.
By Alison Powers, Cooperative & Community Initiatives Manager
In early 2020, Capital Impact Partners, in partnership with the National Cooperative Bank, awarded a total of $100,000 to three awardees, – ChiFresh Kitchen, The Guild, and the Bronx Cooperative Development Initiative – through its Co-op Innovative Award. Capital Impact’s Co-op Innovative Award aims to increase co-op development in communities with low incomes and/or communities of color. This year, the Co-op Innovation Award focused on organizations educating new audiences on the impact and potential of the cooperative model to disrupt income inequality, steward community ownership, and create strong vibrant places of opportunity.
Ellis Carr is now the president and CEO of Capital Impact Partners and CDC Small Business Finance. Kurt Chilcott, formerly president and CEO of CDC Small Business Finance, has transitioned to Board Chair of the combined organization. We invite you to learn more about our new enterprise at www.investedincommunities.org
We recognized that we had a special opportunity to create greater change together than we could individually in the communities we serve and beyond. This is an exciting journey we are embarking on and we want to share how the idea of creating an alliance came about and our vision for the future.
Tune in to the third video of our new series, “CEO Conversations” where CDC Small Business Finance’s CEO Kurt Chilcott and Capital Impact Partners CEO, Ellis Carr discuss what problems the alliance will be focused on solving.
For generations, systemic racism has kept many people of color from achieving even a basic standard of living, which includes social services that help communities thrive.
As we wrote in the first of our series looking at the repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic on communities of color, the disproportionate impacts on communities of color have made these deep inequalities undeniable nationwide.
Ellis Carr is now the president and CEO of Capital Impact Partners and CDC Small Business Finance. Kurt Chilcott, formerly president and CEO of CDC Small Business Finance, has transitioned to Board Chair of the combined organization. We invite you to learn more about our new enterprise at www.investedincommunities.org
CDC Small Business Finance and Capital Impact Partners recently announced a new alliance between the two companies.
We recognized that we had a special opportunity to create greater change together than we could individually in the communities we serve and beyond. This is an exciting journey we are embarking on and we want to share how the idea of creating an alliance came about and our vision for the future.
Welcome to the second video of our new series, “CEO Conversations,” where CDC Small Business Finance’s CEO Kurt Chilcott and Capital Impact Partners CEO, Ellis Carr discuss the new alliance.
Ellis Carr is now the president and CEO of Capital Impact Partners and CDC Small Business Finance. Kurt Chilcott, formerly president and CEO of CDC Small Business Finance, has transitioned to Board Chair of the combined organization. We invite you to learn more about our new enterprise at www.investedincommunities.org
CDC Small Business Finance and Capital Impact Partners recently announced a new alliance between the two companies.
We recognized that we had a special opportunity to create greater change together than we could individually in the communities we serve and beyond. This is an exciting journey we are embarking on and we want to share how the idea of creating an alliance came about and our vision for the future.
This post was written by OFN Blog guest authors and OFN members BlueHub Capital, Capital Impact Partners, IFF, Nonprofit Finance Fund, LISC, Low Income Investment Fund (LIIF), Reinvestment Fund, and Self-Help
Introduction
In recent years, community development financial institutions (CDFIs) and similar mission-oriented financial services organizations have begun to elevate the importance of explicitly addressing racial equity in lending, investing, and operational practices. While this goal remains urgent, it is also a challenge to determine precisely how to incorporate or operationalize racial equity into our varied work. How do CDFIs incorporate an explicit racial equity perspective into their lending? What work do we need to do as institutions and individuals to genuinely build that racial equity perspective? And how might we collaborate across our industry to successfully achieve that goal?
As of July 1, 2021, Ellis Carr is now the president and CEO of Capital Impact Partners and CDC Small Business Finance. Kurt Chilcott, formerly president and CEO of CDC Small Business Finance, is transitioning to Board Chair of both organizations.
In 2020, Kurt Chilcott and Ellis Carr sat down for a video series of conversations about our alliance. You can also watch the whole video series here.
By Ellis Carr, President and CEO
Since 1982, Capital Impact Partners has helped people build communities of opportunity that break barriers to success. We have done that through learning and evolving with a range of investors, donors, community partners, and other Community Development Financial Institutions.
As we looked to the future, we saw a tremendous opportunity to do more, give more, and make a bigger difference. With that in mind, more than a year ago, we began conversations with CDC Small Business Finance. Together, we recognized how our similar visions and complementary expertise, services and financing products could create a change that neither of us could accomplish independently.
Editor’s note: This conversation took place virtually to protect all participants during the COVID-19 pandemic. There may be sound issues, as this was a live webinar.
As COVID-19 continues to disproportionately impact communities of color, it is important that supporting diverse developers does not stop. As not only business owners, but community builders, diverse developers come from, live within, and understand the investments that often disinvested communities want for themselves and future generations. However, because of systemic disinvestment, diverse developers have far fewer opportunities to engage in their chosen profession or create the lived environments that would support communities of color.
The events of the past weeks have been incredibly painful to witness. While in the midst of a global health crisis, the disease of racism reared its ugly head to create a crisis within a crisis in which unarmed Black men and women are being threatened or killed.
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