The U.S. Department of Treasury’s CDFI Fund has awarded Cinnaire $10 million through the Capital Magnet Fund, a competitive grant program designed to support the creation and preservation of affordable housing. The CDFI Fund Fiscal Year 2021 awards total $336.4 million to 59 organizations, marking the largest award round since the creation of the Capital Magnet Fund.
The Capital Magnet Fund awards grants to CDFIs, like Cinnaire, and qualified nonprofit housing organizations to develop, rehabilitate, preserve, and purchase affordable housing, particularly housing targeted to low-, very low-, and extremely low-income families.
“The Capital Magnet Fund plays an essential role providing capital to support affordable housing options for those that need it most,'” said Katey Forth, Cinnaire Executive Vice President, Public Funding. “Since 2011, Cinnaire has used Capital Magnet Fund grants to leverage private financing to address housing instability in vulnerable communities across our footprint, creating a positive impact for families and local economies.”
Awardees are required to leverage their awards to produce housing and community investments at least ten times the size of the award amount, guaranteeing that from this funding round a minimum of $3.36 billion will be invested to support people and communities across the country. For the FY 2021 round, awardees estimate that nearly $12.8 billion will be invested in total, including more than $9.8 billion in private investment.
“I am proud to announce the recipients of the FY 2021 Capital Magnet Fund awards, our largest award round ever,” said CDFI Fund Director Jodie Harris. “The lack of affordable housing is a persistent problem for our country. Expanding the reach of the Capital Magnet Fund to more organizations – one third of which are first-time Capital Magnet Fund awardees – will support vital financing for affordable housing and related economic development and community services facilities that our community urgently needs.”
The 59 awardees will collectively serve 47 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Thirty awardees plan to invest a portion of their award in Rural Areas, with nine of those awardees planning to invest at least half of their award dollars in Rural Areas. Of the 59 total awardees, 32 are Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs), and 27 are non-profit housing organizations. The 59 awardees were selected pursuant to a merit-based competitive review of applications submitted from 146 organizations that requested more than $991.8 million from the FY 2021 Capital Magnet Fund round.
About the CDFI Fund
Since its creation in 1994, the CDFI Fund has awarded more than $5.5 billion to CDFIs, community development organizations, and financial institutions through: the Bank Enterprise Award Program; the Capital Magnet Fund; the CDFI Rapid Response Program; the Community Development Financial Institutions Program, including the Healthy Food Financing Initiative; the Economic Mobility Corps; the Financial Education and Counseling Pilot Program; the Native American CDFI Assistance Program; and the Small Dollar Loan Program. In addition, the CDFI Fund has allocated $66 billion in tax credit allocation authority to Community Development Entities through the New Markets Tax Credit Program and closed guaranteed bonds for more than $1.8 billion through the CDFI Bond Guarantee Program.
