Stories

Otis Zanders, executive director of Ujamaa Place; Atum Azzahir, executive director of Cultural Wellness Center; and Mihailo Temali, CEO of the Neighborhood Development Center.
By Jennifer Wilding
The loan purchase program was a pilot, a new model that Dan Fagan hoped more banks could adopt. “We just decided that we were going to plow forward."
Business Launch Boot Camp Retrospective
By Jennifer Wilding
In 2011, Ariel Cisneros from the Kansas City Fed invited Rob Smith to pitch at Investment Connection. In the three years following the event, Smith raised about $300,000. The funding came at a pivotal moment.
Cheryl Thomas, founder of C's Daycare
By Kierra Karemani
Banks partner with a community non-profit to help a small business owner upgrade and expand her child care facility.
Samantha Evans - Future of Workforce Conference
By Katherine Rondeau-Fiore
Sam Evans of the St. Louis Fed brings the Federal Reserve's rural development expertise home to Toad Suck, Arkansas.
Alex Fuentes
By Ellen Simon
The American Voices Project began as a way to study US poverty. It has grown into a trove of personal narrative and oral history of how people across the US experienced the COVID-19 pandemic.
Shonterria Charleston
By Ellen Simon
For Housing Assistance Council, rural development issues include broadband access and helping veterans fund home improvement projects.
Edison Reyes
By Katherine Rondeau-Fiore
Get to know Edison Reyes and his work to improve workforce outcomes from the Peace Corps to the New York Fed.
Aquatic Therapy of Chinatown, Philadelphia, PA
By Kierra Karemani
CDFI helps two business owners in Philadelphia's Chinatown find a lifeline, and a partner, right in their own backyard.
Goodwill TulsaWorks
By Kierra Karemani
From job training and industry-recognized skills certificates to job placement services and financial literacy education, get to know one program helping low- and moderate-income residents of Oklahoma and southwest Missouri enter the workforce.
Bonnie Blankenship
By Stacey Guinn
Get to know Bonnie Blankenship and her work as a regional outreach manager with the Cleveland Fed.