Ohio's Opportunity Zones Get Failing Grades
V.2, N.45
As the 2024 presidential election heats up, expect former President Donald Trump to boast about all the good he did for America’s communities by enacting “Opportunity Zones,” which provide significant tax benefits for developers who build projects in economically depressed areas. Our lead story summarizes a new report from Good Jobs First, evaluating the impact of 1,600 Opportunity Zone investments in Ohio totaling more than $1 billion.
The conclusion? The main beneficiaries are—surprise!—real estate developers. The investments largely focused on upscale urban and college communities, and wound up gentrifying them and making them less racially diverse. The authors ultimately recommend defunding the program.
According to the lead analyst Anya Gizis, “Opportunity Zones are not driving investment to places in Ohio that have historically seen little development. Instead, they appear to be windfalls for wealthy people and corporations. Ohio and its cities should turn their attention toward economic development strategies that actually benefit historically neglected or disinvested places.”
Other stories you’ll find in this issue of the MSJ:
Now that Minneapolis is requiring a minimum wage for struggling gig drivers, Uber and Lyft are threatening to split town. Drivers, however, can’t leave and won’t give up. So instead, they are creating their own cooperative, just as drivers in New York City did in 2020.
Crowdfund Insider provides a valuable set of recommendations for reforming Regulation A+, used by larger companies to raise up to $75 million in capital.
ImpactAlpha has two articles by Amy Cortese on how Green Banks—and community capital consortia—are mobilizing to take advantage of the $27 billion available for low-income communities under the Inflation Reduction Act.
Speaking of Amy Cortese, she will be our featured interview in next week’s MSJ Extra!, along with the latest local investment listings. Last week, we interviewed Devin Thorpe, who described his upcoming online SuperCrowd24 event happening next week. You can subscribe to the MSJ Extra! through this handy link.
~ Michael Shuman, Publisher
NEWS
Opportunity Zones Failing Ohio’s Disinvested Areas, Good Jobs First (March 25)
Uber and Lyft Drivers in Minneapolis Consider Joining Drivers’ Cooperative, Co-op News (April 2)
Reg A+ Needs Some Fixes, Crowdfund Insider (March 25)
Path to a US Green Bank, ImpactAlpha (March 28)
Community Ownership and The Great Deployment, ImpactAlpha (March 26)
WHAT YOU MISSED IN LAST WEEK’S MSJ EXTRA!
Don't Miss SuperCrowd: April 17-18
Each year, the whole local investment family gets together, and like Thanksgiving dinner, you don’t want to miss it. That’s why we interviewed Devin Thorpe for this issue, the organizer of the SuperCrowd24 Conference, which takes place virtually in two weeks. Devin has one of the biggest, most informed viewpoints on the community capital movement, and I hope you enjoy our conversation.
SPONSOR CORNER
The National Coalition for Community Capital (NC3) is dedicated to educating, advocating, and activating community capital—and serves as MSJ's fiscal sponsor. Thank you for being a part of a growing movement! We can't wait to connect with you and hope you will take the first step of joining our membership. All new and existing members are welcome and encouraged to reach out at any point to schedule a conversation with us—simply email info@nc3now.org.
NC3 UPDATES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
NC3 will roll out a statewide (Michigan) educational program for start-up businesses to pursue investment capital from their community as part of our 2.5-year project through the EDA-funded ERC program. In pursuit of this goal, our first phase is to integrate with existing educational programs conducted by Michigan Entrepreneurial Support Organizations (ESOs). Last week, we held an initial collaboration meeting with organization leaders from across Michigan. This session provided valuable input on potential organizational partners. We concluded the meeting with a clear path forward and with partners who will accelerate our work with ESOs to benefit Michigan entrepreneurs and communities.
NC3 looks forward to seeing you at SuperCrowd24 on April 17-18. Be sure to get your tickets today and save 50% with the discount code NC3MEMBER.
PARTNER NEWS & VOICES
Move Your Money Update, American Independent Business Alliance (April 7)
Employee Ownership Then and Now, Project Equity (March 29)
The Challenges Of Shifting Ownership, Transform Finance (March 26)
A Call to Strengthen Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Through Crowdfunding, Crowdfund Capital Advisors (March 23)
Celebrating Women’s Impact, PathLight Law (March 21)
NEW INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITIES
Our complete list of recently posted investment opportunities has moved to MSJ Extra! As a teaser, here is an offering from our list. (Please note that our listing of these opportunities is not an endorsement, and remember that all investments are risky, so click on the hyperlinks and read all the details carefully before investing.)
IMBY (Hudson, NY), Honeycomb Credit: Empowers communities to create their own digital newspaper.
LOCAL ECONOMY FUNDS HIGHLIGHT
Chicago TREND Real Estate Fund Raises $10 million, ImpactAlpha (July 2023)
NOTABLE NEW RESOURCES
New Generational Wealth in Detroit, Institute for Local Self-Reliance (April 4)
EVENTS
Supercrowd24 - Virtual Event. April 17 - 18.
Remaking the Economy: How to Change Our Stories about the Economy - Virtual Event. April 17, at 2 pm ET.
Investment Crowdfunding Demystified - Virtual Event. April 23, at 2 pm ET.
How to Design an Equitable Retirement Plan - Virtual Event. April 25, at 2 pm ET.
ICYMI
Socially Responsible Investing is Under Attack, Democracy Now
Works for All Film Discussion with Worker-Owned Cooperative Advocates, American Independent Business Alliance
A Different Way to Create Money, Reimagine
JOBS BOARD
Black Farmer Fund: Business Support Director and Development and Investor Relations Director
Mission Driven Finance: CARE Finance Senior Director and Senior Data and Analytics Engineer
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Michael and Jen, are either of you seeing examples, however rare, of uses of Opportunity Zones paired with crowdfunding or other community capital initiatives? When I ran for Congress, I visited at length with some rural county commissioners about Opportunity Zones and together, we couldn't come up with a strategy to use them.