Location Category: gaithersburg_md

Gaithersburg, MD

Financial Empowerment Cities

Financial empowerment efforts best achieve high-quality scale and impact when they are integrated into, and led by, local government. Across the country, city and county leaders have turned to financial empowerment strategies to build their residents’ financial stability, with a number of localities moving beyond a single program or policy to a dedicated Office of Financial Empowerment.

Across more than a decade of work and 100+ city and county partner experiences, the CFE Fund has seen the importance of dedicated leadership to catalyze other opportunities, like connecting financial empowerment to Mayoral priorities, fundraising opportunities, and policy efforts. With generous support from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the CFE Fund is supporting cohort of local leaders to launch and lead a newly established local Office of Financial Empowerment through our Financial Empowerment Cities (FE Cities) initiative.

Through the FE Cities initiative, the CFE Fund supports cohorts of local leaders, trained in a two-year training program. Each OFE Leader will work with the CFE Fund to launch and lead a newly established local Office of Financial Empowerment, managing existing and launching new financial empowerment programs and initiatives. OFE Leaders will also serve as the local government’s internal financial empowerment consultant; bring a financial stability lens to a range of related issues; and leverage their leadership role to ensure financial empowerment is central to local anti-poverty efforts.

If you have any questions, please contact Kant Desai, Senior Principal.

Financial Navigators

Thank you to our many municipal and funding partners for making this pandemic-era program such a bold and nimble success. Across 31 cities and counties, trained navigators helped thousands of residents identify and then access public resources targeted to address their individual needs. 

This program also has informed the CFE Fund’s Emergency Financial Empowerment program. To learn more about either program, please contact Sol Vilera Ramos, Principal.

 

The Financial Navigators initiative helped residents deal with the financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, providing remote assistance in navigating critical financial issues and making referrals to other social services and resources. With support from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Citi Foundation, JPMorgan Chase & Co., and the Wells Fargo Foundation, the CFE Fund partnered with 31 local governments across the country, providing them with technical assistance and funding to launch a new public Financial Navigators program.

Trained Financial Navigators provided structured guidance over the phone to help people strategize around supports for disruptions to their income and other financial concerns. They helped residents triage financial issues, identify immediate action steps, and make referrals to other services. Assistance included managing expenses through prioritizing payments and when to make them, as well as maximizing income through ensuring receipt of federal payments, unemployment benefits, and other resources. In partner cities and counties across the country, helping residents navigate the financial impact of COVID-19 through the Financial Navigators initiative was a critical part of front-line emergency response efforts.

Financial Empowerment Center Replication Initiative

Financial Empowerment Center (FEC) clients receive free, one-on-one professional counseling assistance with money management, budgeting, reducing debt, establishing and improving credit, connecting to safe and affordable banking services, building savings, preparing for legacy planning and protecting their assets, and referrals to other services and organizations. In partnership with Bloomberg Philanthropies, and additional generous support from Principal Foundation and the Wells Fargo Foundation, the CFE Fund is promoting FEC replication through cohorts of local leaders who are developing, launching, and implementing financial counseling as a free public service, along with strategic research projects to enhance the success of financial counseling. Get in touch to join as a supportive funding partner. 

The CFE Fund supports selected cities and counties interested in launching a Financial Empowerment Center through FEC Academy, a structured planning process designed to help local governments bring the FEC model to their communities. Through technical assistance, planning resources, training, and peer learning opportunities, FEC Academy helps local governments build the partnerships, funding strategies, and operational plans needed to launch and sustain a Financial Empowerment Center, providing professional, one-on-on financial counseling as a local public service.  

The Financial Empowerment Center Model

Professionally trained counselors support their clients in navigating complex financial challenges and choices, helping them identify and meet present challenges and future ambitions. Local governments offer FEC financial counseling as a free stand-alone public service, but also via integration into other social services including housing and foreclosure prevention services, workforce development, prisoner reentry, benefits access, domestic violence prevention, and more. Learn more at www.fecpublic.org.

Financial Empowerment Center Evaluation Findings

In 2013, the CFE Fund awarded its first grants to replicate the model in five cities through a $16.2 million, 3-year investment by Bloomberg Philanthropies. An Evaluation of Financial Empowerment Centers: Building People’s Financial Stability As a Public Service, demonstrates the success of the 5-city implementation, drawing on data from 22,000 clients who participated in 57,000 counseling sessions across the first 5 city replication partners. 

The CFE Fund continues to enhance the FEC model; for example, we recently announced the addition of legacy planning (read the press release here) as a core FEC service area. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bank On

Bank On coalitions are locally-led partnerships between local public officials; city, state, and federal government agencies; financial institutions; and community organizations that work together to help improve the financial stability of unbanked and underbanked individuals and families in their communities. In addition to connecting people to safe and affordable accounts, Bank On coalitions also work to raise public awareness, target outreach to the unbanked, and expand access to financial education.

The CFE Fund’s Bank On national initiative builds on this grassroots movement, supporting local coalitions with strategic and financial support, as well as by liaising nationally with banking, regulatory, and nonprofit organization partners to expand banking access, including through the first-ever Bank On National Account Standards, updated for 2025 – 2026. The CFE Fund announced an online Bank On account validation and certification process; banks and credit unions across the country, at no cost, can submit for validation products they believe meet the national Standards. The list of financial institutions offering such products continues to expand across the country.