MESSAGE FROM LEADERSHIP

Dear Friends and Partners,

I am so thrilled that LISC Louisville has completed its first year of service to Louisville. We believe strongly in a placed-based strategy, supportive of the grassroots organizations and institutions that make up our targeted 11 neighborhoods of promise. Our first year has been filled with community engagement activities with residents, elected officials, and community development agencies. Through this engagement, I have been reminded how resilient and focused our city is, despite a myriad of long-term challenges. In its more than 40 years of work around the country, LISC’s strategy has always been to partner with community to help create safe, equitable, and forward moving communities of color. My staff and I are committed to playing a vital role in the creation and sustainability of thriving neighborhoods that build and transfer wealth through enhanced entrepreneurism, homeownership, and sound individual and family financial principles.

Louisville’s famous son, Muhammad Ali, once said “If your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough.” Well, let me say that the dreams and aspirations of Louisvillians are BIG and BOLD, and LISC Louisville aims to be the partner that helps bring those dreams and aspirations to life! In 2022, with the assistance of incredible funders, LISC Louisville provided financial support to enhance the BIPOC small business landscape, which resulted in more than 200 businesses receiving assistance with business plan creation, long-term strategy development, and access to needed capital. In addition, our partnerships with West Louisville-based, BIPOC-led nonprofits has been rewarding. Our work delivering LISC’s proprietary tool, CapMap, is enhancing the capacity of these amazing neighborhood serving agencies, helping build up individuals and families with supportive services across a broad spectrum needed for long-term success.

Since 2020, LISC and our affiliates have invested nearly $13 million in Louisville in additions to the $13 million invested in prior years. In addition to the aforementioned work, LISC Louisville has directed investment to the critical need of preserving affordable housing, as well as delivering resources for a community facility that provides youth with character building sports activities and community building programming. Looking towards our second year, my staff and I will continue to reaffirm our commitment to developing and enhancing the small business ecosystem, equitable lending and capacity building of our vital grassroots organizations. In addition, we aim to elevate the priorities of underserved communities by identifying local initiatives to support with financial resources and/or technical assistance, when aligned with our goals and mission. After all, the acronym LISC does stand for Local Initiatives Support Corporation!

As you review this report, it is my hope that you see the early impact our office has made in Louisville, especially across our 11-neighborhood footprint. I look forward to working with and learning from Louisville’s residents and community-rooted organizations to amplify their needs and concerns with our trusted partners so that, together, we build a more equitable, just, and resilient community.