HOPE is both an action-oriented, boots-on-the-ground service provider and a trailblazing advocate for policies and practices that promote opportunity.
HOPE’s record of success lies in its close connections to the communities and people it serves. It’s this frontline work that positions HOPE to speak with authority on policy matters, ultimately leading to lasting impact.
Since its inception, HOPE has leveraged billions of dollars and improved the lives of millions in the Deep South and across the nation. Through advocacy, HOPE dramatically expands its impact while also changing the systems that make its work so necessary in the first place.
Closing the Financial Services Gap
Consumers who have access to mainstream financial institutions, including banks and credit unions, have a government-insured, non-predatory financial resource that enables them to save, build credit, secure loans for automobiles or homes, or finance a small business.
Nationally, one in four Americans has no relationship with a financial institution. These consumers don’t have access to loans for mortgages or capital to grow small businesses; in many cases, they don’t even have access to an ATM or a place to open a basic checking account.
HOPE works to create paths out of poverty by closing this financial services gap.
Rural Places, Rural Spaces
Some of the most important work undertaken by HOPE in 2017-18 was its advocacy for increasing investment in persistent poverty areas – places where the poverty rate has exceeded 20 percent for three decades or more in a row.
As part of the U.S. Partnership on Mobility from Poverty, HOPE focused national attention on the connection between financial services and economic mobility – particularly in persistent poverty areas. A resulting paper, titled, Opening Mobility Pathways by Closing the Financial Services Gap, was the catalyst for a HOPE-hosted June 2018 forum in Birmingham, Alabama, which convened representatives from the banking, philanthropic, and public sectors to build upon recommendations in the paper and forge action steps for moving forward.
In early 2019, HOPE’s policy forum, titled “Rural Places, Rural Spaces: Closing Financial Service Gaps in Persistent Poverty America,” brought Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to Itta Bena, Mississippi to underscore the importance of investing in historically underserved people and places. The forum generated coverage on the NBC “Today” show, CNBC, and the Wall Street Journal.
After 25 years of injecting capital into low-income areas, HOPE continues to take the argument for increasing investment in those communities to the highest levels of United States policy development, finance, and philanthropy.
Small Town Partnership
Small, rural towns often lack community and economic development staff, leaving them at a disadvantage when competing for resources.
HOPE’s Small Towns Partnership has responded to that need in seven Mississippi towns by working hand-in-hand with local residents, leaders, and stakeholders to identify needs and develop plans to help their communities grow and thrive.
One outcome of the planning process was an innovative program to remove abandoned houses and create related jobs in Shaw, Drew, and Yazoo City. HOPE partnered with these towns, the Mississippi Home Corporation, and local businesses to dismantle the homes and recycle the materials, resulting in the removal of 38 blighted properties and the employment of five to eight individuals per house, who received on-the-job training in the building and construction trades by learning how to deconstruct a home.
