News

Remembering and Honoring Jeremy Nowak and other news

Jeremy Nowak was a visionary leader, who worked tirelessly for equity in low-income communities. As we grieve the loss of our founder, we share with you a glimpse into his brilliance and what made him one-of-a-kind.

We at Reinvestment Fund are grieving the loss of our founder, Jeremy Nowak. Jeremy was a powerful, insightful and tireless voice for our nation’s underserved people and places. The world is diminished by his passing.

Jeremy established Reinvestment Fund to make investments in underserved communities to increase equity of access to resources and strengthen neighborhoods—that was 33 years and $2 billion ago. He organized people, then he organized money, community capacity rallied, and all along the way he organized how we think about problems and their solutions. In his tool box, he carried relentless rigor and clarity of purpose. Among our value statements at Reinvestment Fund is a commitment to “transcend the transactional”—a pure distillation of the legacy of Jeremy’s vision and leadership.

Reinvestment Fund and The Philadelphia Foundation announced the launch of PhilaImpactFund, a new place-based impact investment opportunity targeted to the Greater Philadelphia region. The Fund is believed to be a first-of-its-kind collaboration between a community foundation, The Philadelphia Foundation, and an asset manager that also originates community development loans, Reinvestment Fund. Each organization has committed $5 million toward PhilaImpact Fund’s $30 million goal.

PhilaImpact Fund offers an opportunity for investors to channel their capital into neighborhood development projects that support regional growth and local initiatives in the communities that need them the most. The Fund will support projects serving critical needs for people across the region promoting housing stability for low-income families, better health outcomes, higher educational attainment, greater access to fresh, healthy food, and more.

Reinvestment Fund’s Senior Policy Advisor, Patricia Smith, has been named President and CEO of The Funders’ Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities, a robust network of more than 170 philanthropic foundations across the U.S. and Canada.

Introducing the PhilaImpact Fund and other news

Reinvestment Fund and The Philadelphia Foundation are pleased to announce the launch of the PhilaImpact Fund, a new fixed-income product for impact investors who want to enhance the growth of the greater Philadelphia region.

Reinvestment Fund announced the launch of a new Clean Energy Fund, which will provide financing for small and mid-sized projects implementing energy efficiency, renewable energy and other clean energy technologies that otherwise have limited access to traditional capital markets. First capital for the Fund comes from a subsidiary of MetLife, Inc., one of the world’s leading financial services companies, which is providing $10 million in debt and Reinvestment Fund, which is investing $2.5 million.

The Fund has already committed its first loan to Affordable Community Energy Services Company (ACE) to perform comprehensive energy efficiency and water conservation projects for Mercy Housing in California, the nation’s largest nonprofit owner of low-income housing. The $6 million project will benefit 6,000 affordable housing units in 90 multifamily residential buildings in California.

Reinvestment Fund received a $4.5 million Capital Magnet Fund award from the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s CDFI Fund. The award was part of $120 million awarded to 40 community development financial institutions and housing nonprofits. Reinvestment Fund plans to use the award to address affordable housing challenges by providing capital to housing projects serving high-need communities and relieving housing cost burdens for low-income families.

Reinvestment Fund announced today that its ‘AA’ issuer credit rating has been affirmed by S&P Global Ratings. Reinvestment Fund is a social enterprise lending organization and among a handful of such institutions that has been rated by S&P Global Ratings. This rating is a powerful recognition of Reinvestment Fund’s demonstrated ability to meet its financial commitments through the strategic investment of capital to revitalize struggling communities.

Across the country, nearly 40 million Americans live in rural and urban neighborhoods where easy access to affordable, high-quality, and healthy food is out of reach. A new bill, introduced by Representatives Marcia Fudge (D-OH) and Dwight Evans (D-PA), addresses this critical issue by bolstering an existing program that has demonstrated success in improving access to healthy foods and spurring economic revitalization in underserved communities. The “Healthy Food Financing Initiative Reauthorization Act” would reauthorize the Healthy Food Financing Initiative (HFFI) program at United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Office of Rural Development, originally established at the agency in the Agricultural Act of 2014.

Reinvestment Fund received a $70 million New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) allocation award today as part of the 14^th round of awards announced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s CDFI Fund. Reinvestment Fund will use its award to finance high-impact projects that drive economic opportunity in struggling communities across the nation. Reinvestment Fund is among 73 awardees who received a total of $3.5 billion in awards this round.