SBAN hosts conferences, workshops, and seminars. In 2022, our national conference will bring together small business leaders from across our network to identify the challenges facing small businesses in gentrifying neighborhoods, share knowledge about innovative policy and practice, and identify ways to push new policy in different regions. Multiple regional conferences are planned for the year following. Stay tuned for information about these and other upcoming virtual and in-person events.
SBAN Members-Only Webinar
Ryan Kelley, Manager of Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) and place-based strategies for Hennepin County, Minnesota, will talk about the county’s Community Asset Transition (CAT) Fund, managed by LISC Twin Cities. The program has helped BIPOC business owners buy commercial property in the area affected by the civil unrest after the murder of George Floyd. Ryan will outline other new programs that support BIPOC entrepreneurs and address commercial affordability, and he’ll share pilot program challenges.
Hennepin County, the largest in the state, includes the Twin Cities region and has some of the starkest racial disparities. The COVID-19 pandemic and the civil unrest and property destruction following George Floyd’s murder magnified these disparities, in particular the increased risk of displacement and gentrification in certain areas. Hennepin County invested $3 million in the CAT fund to create a pool of readily available capital that allows community-based owners and developers to quickly acquire commercial and residential property that community partners have identified as high priority and at risk for market conversion.
Registration, for SBAN Members Only: http://go.umd.edu/sban-sept-webinar