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October 06, 2008
Book Review-Good Policies For a Great America, published by Opportunity Finance Network
by Anne Moore Odell
A new collection of essays on the impact and possibilities of the opportunity finance industry is a
guidebook for the next President and Congress.
SocialFunds.com --
Congress and the President have their hands full with the current economic meltdown that is
threatening to drown Wall Street and possibly deluge Main Street as well. Much has been made about
the subprime mortgages and bad lending practices have helped create the current economic crisis. At
the same time, however, the finance industry and community development finance institutions (CDFIs)
are drawing up a roadmap to economic stability.
 For the last thirty years, people working in
the opportunity finance industry have helped low income and low wealth people, communities with
little or no access to traditional banking services and small businesses gain economic stability
and freedom. The new book "Good Policies For a Great America," published by Opportunity Finance Network and edited by Sandra
Kerr and Cheryl Neas, offers essays by some of the leading minds of the opportunity finance
industry with specific recommendations for domestic policies designed to create new opportunities
for economic growth.
CDFIs have successfully been lending to the low-income markets where
traditional institutions and subprime lenders have failed. The foreclosure rate on mortgages made
through CDFIs is incredibly low, under 1% for most CDFI mortgages. This compares with the 20% of
mortgages offered by subprime lenders which have been defaulted on.
The Opportunity
Finance Network (OFN) is the national organization for CDFIs. OFN notes that CDFIs have brought
over $25 billion in financing to under-banked communities over the past three decades. Using the
market to help create opportunities, OFN points to the success of CDFIs' use of federal funding.
The US Treasury Department reports that every dollar of federal money invested with CDFIs leverages
between $19 and $27 in new private sector investments.
Although the demand for loans from
the federal CDFI Fund has increased rapidly, showing a 122% increase in 2008, the level of federal
funding has been lowered 46% between 2001 to 2006. One of the top policy recommendations in "Good
Policies For a Great America" is increased funding for the US Treasury Department CDFI Fund, with a
minimum of $250 million a year.
Another of the book's strong recommendations is making the
New Market Tax Credit (NMTC) permanent. The NMTC allows individual and corporate investors to claim
a tax credit worth 39% of their initial investments in Community Development Entities (CDEs). The
tax credits are distributed over seven years. CDEs make loans and capital investments in
communities underserved by traditional banks.
The collection of essays covers many topics
concerning the opportunity finance industry, including small businesses, nonprofits, homeownership,
rural revitalization, the environment, and asset accumulation and protection. While the book was
written before the current financial crisis and the shake-up at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, much of
the CDFI community was well aware of what was on the economic horizon, with calls throughout the
text for greater regulation and oversight of mainstream and federal banking.
One of the
strengths of the diverse essays included in the book is that instead of pointing fingers, every one
of the essays offers specific and concrete steps for the federal government to take to strengthen
communities all over the United States. Every essay also includes a case study of how an
individual, small business or non-profit was able to prosper with the help of a CDFI.
Two
goals of many of the policies presented the book are, first, encouraging the Federal government to
make public markets more inclusive and, second, developing assets to make the assets "market
ready." For example, public markets can be more inclusive by fully funding the Federal CDFI Fund
and within the Fund, creating a research program that would work to create new financial products
to help poor communities.
According to Kerr and Neas not only poor communities gain from
strengthened policies regarding funding for opportunity finance; the entire US population is made
stronger. The book states: "Markets are the mechanism for wealth creation in our nation and
determine which people, places, and assets get included. Economics is not a zero-sum game-when one
person gets richer, it does not mean that another must get poorer. Having more people and places
participate in the market economy contributes to the country's overall economic condition. As long
as significant numbers of assets are left out, the market economy is not performing to its
potential."
The opportunity finance movement is not asking for handouts or special deals
for only certain sections of the population. It embraces the market and calls instead for the
federal government to help make the market more inclusive. For people inside and outside
government, "Good Policies For a Great America" is a both primer to the current federal funding
sources that support opportunity finance, and a guide for the directions the opportunity finance
industry could help lead the economy in upcoming years
©
SRI World Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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