Mobilizing Funds
for Investment
in Communities

Beneficial Electrification League (BEL) promotes the broad advantages of electrification and builds support for electrifying the country’s economy within electric utilities, environmental groups, and communities. BEL is focused on helping rural electric cooperatives and municipal utilities launch modernization projects supported by federal funding. They are also engaging rural communities and rural energy cooperatives to offer technical assistance around the Inflation Reduction Act’s Direct Pay offerings.

The Building Power Resource Center (BPRC) is a new national resource hub for community organizations and government staff, advancing the use of federal funds for new projects in the buildings and power sector. With a focus on co-governance, BPRC facilitates engagement between government and community organizations, unions, and climate groups, to develop state and local programs that drive real benefits into communities that have been left behind. With a grant from Invest in Our Future, BPRC expanded efforts to provide technical assistance and build capacity, address clean energy deployment barriers, and amplify successes generated by co-governance approaches.

Following passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, Calvert Impact, The Community Preservation Corporation, and Self-Help Ventures Fund—three national nonprofit financing entities with deep experience in equitable community development and green finance—joined together to form Climate United. Climate United was recently selected to administer funds from the Inflation Reduction Act’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) and will use these funds to finance green loans for mortgages, building upgrades and retrofits, clean technology adoption, and larger-scale clean energy deployment—the vast majority of which would be invested in low-income and disadvantaged communities, rural communities, and Tribal communities.

Over three decades, the Greenlining Institute has sought to knock down barriers to economic opportunity and advance equity through “greenlining”: driving public and private investment into communities of color. Invest in Our Future awarded the Greenlining Institute a grant to support their “Greenlining the Block” initiative. Launched in 2021, this initiative engages community-based organizations in seven geographic regions nationwide to advance locally-led climate solutions, ranging from clean transportation and renewable-powered resilience hubs to stormwater capture and workforce training. The Greenlining Institute assists partner organizations with planning, developing, and securing funding for projects that will boost climate resilience in each region, while facilitating creation of new relationships with the public and private sector.

Lawyers for Good Government (L4GG) coordinates large-scale pro bono programs, with contributions from 125,000 lawyers and advocates. Every dollar of philanthropic support to L4GG unlocks $10 of pro bono support services from more than a hundred white-shoe law firms. L4GG is creating a pool of expert attorneys specializing in tax, renewable energy, and project finance. These attorneys work directly with state and local governments navigating guidance around new federal clean energy tax investments and incentives, and provide legal assistance to cities, Tribes, and community groups that need help accessing federal funding.

The State Support Center (SSC) connects states with technical assistance providers that can help unlock federal funding from the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. They are working to coordinate and track evolving climate and clean energy needs at the state level, as well as coordinating addressing those needs with technical assistance support providers.

Launched by the New Venture Fund with support from Bloomberg Philanthropies and other philanthropic partners, the Sustainable Cities Fund (SCF) provides strategic regranting and program support for climate action at the local level. SCF convened the Lighthouse Cohort to address the challenges surrounding access to new federal tax incentives for new clean energy projects at the local level. The Lighthouse Cohort is a team of technical assistance and network partners that will guide local governments and community-based organizations through the process of successfully claiming elective pay and other clean energy tax rebates. Invest in Our Future’s grant supported the Lighthouse Cohort’s initial goal of providing a blend of financial, legal, and project assistance to at least 50 cities across 17 states.