In a bid to refinance rural America, the Biden Administration has awarded $1.25 billion in federal funds to 863 community development financial institutions (CDFIs) across the U.S. How can journalists find out where the money is going and whether it will be effective in helping underserved communities around the U.S.?
With small-town banks closing at a record pace, CDFIs are one of the only ways low-income rural Americans can get loans.
This National Press Foundation briefing will introduce journalists to CDFI leaders at ground zero of the effort to refinance rural America with micro-lending and other innovative financing projects aimed at reducing entrenched poverty and inequality. And one of the deans of rural journalism will brief reporters on how to excel at these under-covered stories.
Statistics indicate that the distribution of federal Paycheck Protection Program loans disproportionately benefitted white-owned businesses, whereas Black and Latino small business owners got the least and got it last. (See comparative data from Baltimore here.) Meanwhile, the upward mobility of American children to advance out of poverty has stalled. Only 4.8% of children born to low-income families in the South and poverty pockets throughout the U.S. make it into the top 20% of income earners. Meanwhile, rural access to financing is worsening as banks close branches at a record pace.
CDFIs are designed to fill the gap, and Biden’s Fiscal 2022 budget increases funding for these institutions to $330 million, a 22.2% hike from 2021.
The administration promises that this funding will help unwind systemic racism and decrease racial and geographical inequality. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said that that every dollar pumped into loans from these financial institutions could trigger eight more dollars of private-sector investment, boosting the value of the program to $10 billion.
Learn how to track this federal funding in the communities you cover, see where innovative financing is changing rural America (and where it isn’t), and learn how to report on whether the taxpayer funding is making a difference.
Note: Attending this program qualifies journalists to apply for $12,000 in NPF’s new awards for coverage of poverty and inequality. The three awards, for news organizations of different sizes, will open Dec. 1, 2021. Details here.
Speakers:
William J. (Bill) Bynum, CEO, HOPE, Jackson, Mississippi
Tim Marema, Editor, The Daily Yonder, Norris, Tennessee
Lisa Mensah, President and CEO, Opportunity Finance Network, Washington DC
Ines Polonius, CEO, Communities Unlimited Inc., Fayetteville, Arkansas
Participation in this and one other NPF training on poverty and inequality in America entitles journalists to apply for the 2021 Poverty Awards, which will be offered later this year. See here for details.
This program is funded by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Heising-Simons Foundation. NPF is solely responsible for the content.