Press Releases
July 26th, 2018
JACKSON, MS – Hope Enterprise Corporation/Hope Credit Union (HOPE) recently released its 2017 Impact Report, highlighting a record $100 million in financing to address financial services gaps in low-income, minority and rural communities across the Deep South.
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July 16th, 2018
Grambling, LA – Hope Enterprise Corporation/Hope Credit Union (HOPE) recently joined Grambling, La., officials and developers for the grand opening of Legends Market, the first fresh food retailer to open in the town in 35 years. HOPE was a financing partner on the project that is part of a larger retail shopping center developed by Baton Rouge, La.-based Kimble Development. The market, which had a grand opening on Saturday, July 14, also features a pharmacy, bakery and deli.
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July 9th, 2018
Groundbreaking Held in Mississippi for Camp Kamassa, a Project Financed by HOPE’s Community Facilities Re-Lending Program Work is underway on a new camp in Mississippi for special needs children, and the project received its financing through HOPE’s Community Facilities Relending Program. U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson and Mississippi First Lady Deborah Bryant were among the speakers at the recent ground-breaking for Camp Kamassa in Crystal Springs, Miss. The camp is a project of the Mississippi’s Toughest Kids Foundation, founded in 2008 by Mary Kitchens. The camp will be the first of its kind in Mississippi and both Thompson and Bryant were among those who served as advisors or provided support for the project. Kitchens says the camp’s name, “Kamassa,” is a Choctaw word that means “tough and perseverant,” and it aptly describes the youth it will serve. HOPE’s financing helped to secure materials for the project, which is located on 326 acres and will include several buildings, a sports field, pool, amphitheater and nature trails. Another financing partner on the project was Fahe, one of HOPE’s partners that works to eliminate persistent poverty in Appalachia and also has a Community Facilities Re-Lending Program. Read more. HOPE Opens New Branch at Crosstown Concourse in Memphis, Tennessee HOPE was joined by community partners, credit union members and other supporters to celebrate the opening of its new branch at Crosstown Concourse in Memphis, Tenn. Among the speakers at the event were Tonja Sesley-Baymon, president and CEO of the Memphis Urban League, and Annie Wallace, a HOPE member who attributes her current financial “success” to the credit union. Wallace was living in Chicago when she lost her job and then her home. She exhausted her savings and took a payday loan, to help cover expenses, but her bills and the loan fees continued to escalate. She finally moved to Memphis to stay with a friend, and she soon heard about HOPE, where she first sought credit counseling before receiving a series of credit building loans. “I am a HOPE success,” Wallace told those gathered at the ribbon-cutting ceremony. “HOPE helped me to restore and rebuild. I bought a new home in May and just recently, a new car.” Baymon, also a HOPE member and her organization a partner, applauded HOPE for offering solutions to the issue of payday lending traps in Memphis. Read more. HOPE Raises $105K in Support of Financial Inclusion Work in the Deep South A HOPE campaign launched to highlight financial inclusion work in the Mississippi Delta raised more than $105,000 over a five-day period. The campaign ended the day after HOPE was named the winner of the 2018 Wall Street Journal Financial Inclusion Challenge. Sixty friends of HOPE donated nearly $53,000, unlocking a $50,000 matching gift made in honor of HOPE SVP Phil Eide. The Wall Street Journal Challenge is part of the national publication’s initiative to highlight the struggles that millions of Americans face in attaining financial security. HOPE received the Financial Inclusion Challenge honor “for its efforts to provide […]
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June 28th, 2018
JACKSON, MS – HOPE (Hope Enterprise Corporation/Hope Credit Union) is the winner of the 2018 Wall Street Journal Financial Inclusion Challenge, a competition that is part of an initiative to highlight the struggles that millions of Americans face in attaining financial security. HOPE received the honor “for its efforts to provide banking services in underserved regions of the American South,” according to The Wall Street Journal. HOPE was one of three finalists from more than 120 entries in the first U.S. iteration of the Journal’s Financial Inclusion Challenge.
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June 28th, 2018
Work is underway on a new camp in Mississippi for special needs children, and the project received its financing through HOPE’s Community Facilities Relending Program. U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson and Mississippi First Lady Deborah Bryant were among the speakers at the recent ground-breaking for Camp Kamassa in Crystal Springs, Miss. The camp is a project of the Mississippi’s Toughest Kids Foundation, founded in 2008 by Mary Kitchens.
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June 15th, 2018
JACKSON, MS – Hope Credit Union (HOPE), joined by community partners, credit union members and other supporters, held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Thursday, June 14, for its new branch at Crosstown Concourse in Memphis, Tenn. The new branch is the fifth location in Greater Memphis for HOPE, winner of the 2018 Wall Street Journal Financial Inclusion Challenge. The new branch allows HOPE to expand its ability to provide access to critical financial tools in underserved communities.
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April 9th, 2018
JACKSON, MS – HOPE (Hope Enterprise Corporation/Hope Credit Union) has been named a finalist in The Wall Street Journal Financial Inclusion Challenge for its work to bring opportunity to small towns in the Mississippi Delta. HOPE is one of three finalists from more than 120 entries in the first U.S. iteration of the Journal’s Financial Inclusion Challenge. A winner will be selected in New York City on May 9.
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February 20th, 2018
The US Partnership on Mobility from Poverty, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and staffed by the Urban Institute, has published Opening Mobility Pathways by Closing the Financial Services Gap, a paper co-authored by HOPE. Over the past two years, the Partnership traveled across the country, including a visit to the Mississippi Delta and to East Palo Alto to better understand what it would take to dramatically increase mobility from poverty.
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February 6th, 2018
Washington, D.C. – Despite lower unemployment, a booming stock market and a modest decline in the poverty rate, there is growing evidence that positive economic gains at the national level are not widely shared by low- and moderate-income families in Mississippi, according to a new report from Prosperity Now (formerly CFED). Policymakers are not doing enough to address this imbalance, and future prosperity for Mississippi families is at risk.
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January 24th, 2018
WASHINGTON, DC— A diverse, nonpartisan collection of some of the nation’s leading scholars, policy experts, and practitioners working on solutions to poverty in the US has developed a framework of strategies to change the trajectory for millions of people in America. A new paper, Restoring the American Dream: What Would It Take to Dramatically Increase Mobility from Poverty?, puts forward this framework.
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