COVID, George Floyd, and the Fight for Equity, 2016-2025
by Clifford N. Rosenthal and Dana Archer-Rosenthal
by Clifford N. Rosenthal and Dana Archer-Rosenthal
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Community Development Finance
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Co-Author Dana Archer-Rosenthal is a consultant for the nonprofit and public sectors in program design, funding, and impact evaluation. As a consultant and grant maker, she has worked with dozens of environmental, workforce development, and community development organizations, including the leading CDFIs, Nonprofit Finance Fund and Inclusiv. She carries on the Archer and Rosenthal family traditions of service in the progressive nonprofit sector. Dana is a long-time resident of Brooklyn, New York.
Reviews of Community Development Finance
"...[Community Development Finance] will be a useful and tangible resource for readers heavily involved in the world of nonprofits, credit unions, and the like, featuring such elements as a history of the CDFI certification process and an exploration of CDFIs with environmentalist goals; it may also appeal to aficionados of financial-sector histories."
– Kirkus Reviews
Purchase Community Development FinanceCommunity Development Finance: COVID, George Floyd, and the Fight for Equity, 2016-2025 is available through the following online retailers and for special order at most local bookstores:
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PHOTOGRAPHS (starting top left and moving clockwise)
1. Tongass Federal Credit Union, headquartered in Ketchikan, provides financial access and education to Southeast Alaska’s remote, coastal communities. Rooted in the region’s rich and resilient culture, Tongass creates innovative ways to serve members wherever they live, ensuring that opportunity reaches even the smallest villages. Pictured here are a local resident and the first manager of the credit union’s "community microsite" in Yakutat.
2. Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union opened a new branch in the Bronx, NYC, in December 2024, in a low-income area that had become a banking desert. Started in 1986 in an abandoned bank building, the credit union now serves nearly ten thousand members on the Lower East Side, Staten Island, East Harlem, and the Bronx. Pictured here are staff and community members of the credit union.
3. Working Solutions CDFI, based in San Francisco, provides small-dollar loans to start-up and early-stage businesses across California. Pictured here is one of the 3,000 businesses served by Working Solutions to date: El Tiny Cafe, owned and operated by a husband-and-wife team in Berkeley. El Tiny Cafe received a COVID-19 Resiliency Loan from Working Solutions in partnership with the City of Berkeley.
4. Southern Bancorp was founded in 1986 in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. Its work in rural Arkansas was one of President Bill Clinton’s inspirations for the establishment of the CDFI Fund. With $2.8 billion in assets (as of September 2025), Southern Bancorp has fifty-six locations, primarily in rural Arkansas and Mississippi. Pictured here is Darrin Williams, who has served as CEO of Southern Bancorp, Inc. since 2013.
The work of these community development financial institutions (CDFIs) is described further in Chapter 5 and elsewhere in this book.
1. Tongass Federal Credit Union, headquartered in Ketchikan, provides financial access and education to Southeast Alaska’s remote, coastal communities. Rooted in the region’s rich and resilient culture, Tongass creates innovative ways to serve members wherever they live, ensuring that opportunity reaches even the smallest villages. Pictured here are a local resident and the first manager of the credit union’s "community microsite" in Yakutat.
2. Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union opened a new branch in the Bronx, NYC, in December 2024, in a low-income area that had become a banking desert. Started in 1986 in an abandoned bank building, the credit union now serves nearly ten thousand members on the Lower East Side, Staten Island, East Harlem, and the Bronx. Pictured here are staff and community members of the credit union.
3. Working Solutions CDFI, based in San Francisco, provides small-dollar loans to start-up and early-stage businesses across California. Pictured here is one of the 3,000 businesses served by Working Solutions to date: El Tiny Cafe, owned and operated by a husband-and-wife team in Berkeley. El Tiny Cafe received a COVID-19 Resiliency Loan from Working Solutions in partnership with the City of Berkeley.
4. Southern Bancorp was founded in 1986 in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. Its work in rural Arkansas was one of President Bill Clinton’s inspirations for the establishment of the CDFI Fund. With $2.8 billion in assets (as of September 2025), Southern Bancorp has fifty-six locations, primarily in rural Arkansas and Mississippi. Pictured here is Darrin Williams, who has served as CEO of Southern Bancorp, Inc. since 2013.
The work of these community development financial institutions (CDFIs) is described further in Chapter 5 and elsewhere in this book.
