The nonprofit has an opportunity to tell the story of how the organization adapted to tremendous external changes in the last year.
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic and the renewed focus on racial justice nationwide, LISC increased our focus on supporting equitable recovery and rebuilding. We do this through our new initiative launched in late 2020, Project 10X, a 10-year, $1 billion strategy to bridge racial gaps in health, wealth and opportunity for individuals and communities that are Black, Indigenous and people of color.
During 2020, LISC made more than $2 billion in community investments – a new record for the organization. This included increased affordable housing support, new funding for small businesses, and deep engagement with partners around health, education, safety and jobs. It spanned some $1.5 billion in equity investments, $290 million in community development loans and $240 million in grants—more than four times the level of grantmaking in the prior year.
Over the next three years, LISC will work to institutionalize and embed explicit equity metrics into our organizational culture, language, policies, investments, practices and programs.
Programmatically, we will implement mechanisms to track and report on such metrics as the share of LISC investments that go to BIPOC-led nonprofits, the share of LISC-supported real estate projects that employ diverse enterprises, and the share of LISC investments that go to minority-owned business enterprises.