An article in Black Enterprise highlights Wells Fargo’s Open for Business Fund, through which LISC received $36M to provide grants, loans and expertise to small businesses serving low-income communities and communities of color during the pandemic—including Washington D.C. tailor Julius Lofton. Those investments have leveraged a massive $2.1 billion in impact for business owners, and local economies, nationwide, according to a new study.

Natavia lives in the 800 square-foot family house her grandmother bought on the east side of Jacksonville, Florida almost 80 years ago. Natavia is the third generation to call the property home. “I value the house for the memories,” she said. “I grew up spending the summers with my grandma, hearing the stories of her walking to work way on the other side of town, just to have a home.”

LISC San Diego executive director Ricardo Flores is featured in a deep dive by the city's public broadcasting station on how, beginning in the early 20th century, single-family zoning worked to racially and economically segregate San Diego—and keep it that way. Flores describes LISC's and other collective efforts to dismantle the status quo in the effort to create diverse, affordable neighborhoods.

Anatomy of a Small Biz Partnership with Kevin Hart

Steve Hall, LISC’s vp for small business lending, recently joined entrepreneurship columnist Gene Marks on the Paychex Thrive podcast to describe how LISC’s partnership with Kevin Hart and his Gran Coramino tequila brand gets grants to Black and Latinx small biz owners—and why that’s so important. Part of the beauty of the collaboration, said Hall, is how Hart puts his all into creating opportunity for others, “even through his comedy.”

A deeply reported article in the Miami Herald highlights LISC Jacksonville’s crucial role in supporting Black families with heirs’ property problems, helping them sort out titling issues, avoid the threat of foreclosure and find home maintenance resources. As Dr. Irvin Cohen, executive director of LISC Jax, describes it, for many Black families, solving heirs property issues is a key means to “prop up family wealth creation…and avert a homelessness situation.”