Recent and Upcoming

September 1-2, 2010
REO and Vacant Property Strategies for Neighborhood Stabilization
A summit examining the community impacts of foreclosed and vacant properties

 

Past

Year: 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 1999 | 1998 | 1996

2009

June 24, 2009
College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA
CHAPA Statewide Foreclosure Conference
In 2008, foreclosure deeds totaled nearly 13,000 in Massachusetts, an increase of 400% since 2006. While foreclosures have affected all regions of the state, they have been disproportionately concentrated in low and moderate income neighborhoods.

Local, state, and federal governments have launched a variety of programs and initiatives to reduce foreclosures and stabilize neighborhoods impacted by foreclosed properties. Most recently, President Obama announced a broad-based plan to assist seven to nine million homeowners across the country. This conference will focus on implementation of these initiatives at the local level. What strategies have been effective? What more needs to be done to stem the tide of foreclosures? The conference is geared towards a wide audience including municipal officials, housing counselors, lenders, community-based developers, advocates, practitioners, policy makers, and others.

February 24, 2009
Washington, DC
Revisiting the CRA: A Policy Discussion
With the current financial crisis providing strong impetus for regulatory reform, a re-examination of the CRA seems both appropriate and likely. A joint publication of the Federal Reserve Banks of Boston and San Francisco, Revisiting the CRA: Perspectives on the Future of the Community Reinvestment Act is a timely publication intended to help frame and inform the current debate about the future of the CRA. In concert with the release of the publication, a lively discussion was held where many authors and discussants shared their views at this event on February 24, 2009 in Washington, DC.

2008

May 16, 2008
Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
Investing in Community Development and Other Emerging Domestic Markets
Institutional investors and investment management professionals engaged in nuts and bolts discussions about how to identify appropriate community development investments, evaluate risk, undergo the process of due diligence, engage other trustees in discussion, and build a portfolio incrementally. This workshop was sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, the School of Community Economic Development at Southern New Hampshire University, and AltruShare Securities.

 

2007

December 3, 2007
Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
Working Together to Build Wealth in Lower-Income Communities
A Forum on Strategies for financial institutions, community-based organizations and public programs to expand access to financial services, financial education and asset development. Held at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston on December 3, 2007.

May 2-4, 2007
St. Louis, Missouri
Exploring Innovation: A Conference on Community Development Finance
A culture of innovation provides the foundation so that people can turn ideas into results and improve communities. Innovation can be found in all industries, fields, locations and communities—not just in business, technology, engineering or the physical sciences. This conference will explore the relationship between creativity, learning and innovation in organizations and how that relationship improves performance, increases access to capital and achieves scale and sustainability.

March 29-30, 2007
Financing Community Development:
Learning from the Past, Looking to the Future
The Community Affairs officers of the Federal Reserve System jointly sponsored the fifth biennial research conference March 29-30, 2007 to encourage objective research into the factors governing the availability of credit and capital to individuals and businesses within this changing financial services environment.

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2006

December 6, 2006
Regional Roundtable: Public Pension Funds and Targeted Investing
This conference was sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, Massachusetts State Treasurer Timothy P. Cahill, and the Pension Funds & Urban Revitalization Initiative of the Labor & Worklife Program at Harvard Law School. New England pension fund leaders and other stakeholders from across the region came together to discuss whether investing in the emerging domestic markets can work in smaller cities in New England.

December 5, 2006
Covering the Uninsured: Costs, Benefits, and Policy Alternatives for New England
The conference convened a select group of key stakeholders including policymakers, insurers, hospital administrators, employers, public health advocates, and health policy researchers from across all six New England states and the nation.

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2005

December 15, 2005
Trends In Small Business Financing: Best Theory and Practice
Discussion covered successful state-of-the-art financing models, best practices, and state policy actions to broaden access to capital for small companies. More specifically, participants focused on the following topics:

• Latest changes in financing systems and trends in small enterprise financing
• Best practice and innovative ideas in attracting private capital into high-risk small business financing
• Factors hindering availability of capital to entrepreneurs, especially in low and moderate-income areas, as well as ways to mitigate the problem

November 3 and 4, 2005
Achieving Sustainability, Scale, and Impact in Community Development Finance:
SRI and Community Investing

Conference Proceedings are available

This conference was cosponsored by the Federal Reserve System and the Aspen Institute’s Economic Opportunities Program, and was the second in a series of seven to be held at various Reserve Banks and the Federal Reserve Board of Governors over the next two years.

The basis of the conference series is a paper by the Aspen Institute’s Economic Opportunities Program published by the Chicago Fed’s Consumer and Community Affairs division in December 2004 in its periodical, Profitwise News and Views. “New Pathways to Scale for Community Development Finance” summarizes ten case studies, primarily private sector examples, of successful attempts to broaden the impact and market reach of an assortment of products, services, and organizations.

April 7-8, 2005
Promises & Pitfalls: As Consumer Finances Multiply, Who Is Being Served and at What Cost?
This conference presented current research on trends and innovations in consumer financial markets, with particular emphasis on low- and moderate-income consumers and on underserved populations.

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2003

June 27, 2003
Structuring New Market Tax Credit Deals in New England Breakfast Seminar
The goal of the seminar was to highlight how New Market Tax Credit deals can be structured, and the role of the key parties that will be involved in the deals. This seminar was held on June 27, 2003.

May 1, 2003
Orientation to the Capital Markets
This conference, held on May 1, 2003, was sponsored by partners of Wall Street Without Walls, an initiative connecting the capital markets with nonprofit community-based development organizations.

March 25, 2003
Getting Credit for Business
A forum on strategies to increase access to credit for small businesses, this conference was held on March 25, 2003.

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2002

November 20, 2002
Building Partnerships through Financial Education
Financial education practitioners and bankers discussed their collaborative efforts in financial education and described how their programs have benefitted people in their communities. This conference was held on November 20, 2002.

October 17, 2002
Strengthening Partnerships for Inner-City Entrepreneurship: A Forum for Community-Based Organizations and Funders
This conference offered community-based business assistance providers and their funders an opportunity to share experiences and perspectives on the best ways to promote business creation and growth in low-income urban areas. This conference was held October 17, 2002.

October 8, 2002
Banking on the Community- Untapped Markets: Embracing Potential for Economic Opportunities
This conference was held on October 8, 2002.

May 8, 2002.
New Markets Tax Credit Program Conference
A conference about the New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) program, which has the potential to be an important tool for spurring economic development in low-income communities. This conference was held on May 8, 2002.

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2001

June 6, 2001.
Sunshine Provision Training Seminar on Disclosure and Reporting of CRA-Related Agreements
The final rule to implement the CRA sunshine provision became effective on April 1, 2001. This provision requires nongovernmental entities of persons and insured depository institutions and their affiliates that are parties to certain CRA agreements to make those agreements available to the public and to appropriate agencies. The training provided an overview of the provision and its potential impact on individual organizations. The training was held on June 6 in Boston, June 19 in Rhode Island, and on July 18 in White River Junction, Vermont.

April 5-6, 2001
Federal Reserve System Conference: Changing Financial Markets & Community Development
The Community Affairs Officers of the Federal Reserve System held its second research conference. The conference focused on recent academic research on the effects of recent changes in financial markets on low- and moderate-income communities. The conference was held on April 5-6, 2001 in Washington, D.C. To download conference papers, visit the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's web site.

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1999

June 14, 1999
New England University-Community Partnership Conference
A conference on university, college, and community partnerships was held on June 14, 1999 at Babson College. The New England University-Community Partnership Conference was cosponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, the Massachusetts University-Community Partnerships (MUCP), and the New England Board of Higher Education.

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1998

June 15, 1998
New England Rural Development Conference
A conference on lending, housing, and economic development policy issues that affect rural New England was held on June 15, 1998. The conference was co-sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, Granite State CRA, Massachusetts Rural Development Council, New England Regulatory Compliance Council and the Rural Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC).

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1996

1996
Boston Home Purchase Process Initiative
In 1996 the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston sponsored the Greater Boston Home Purchase Process Initiative. This project partnered the Reserve Bank with home purchase industry professionals, such as realtors, mortgage lenders, home appraisers, and insurance company representatives to identify barriers to homeownership faced by lower-income and minority home buyers.

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