OFN
  • Our Work
    • What is a CDFI?
    • Key Priorities
      • Affordable Housing
      • Financial First Response
      • Climate Change & Resilience
      • Healthy Communities
      • Native Finance
      • Persistent Poverty
      • Racial Equity
      • Rural Development
      • Small Business
    • Impact Stories
    • Impact Data
  • Investing & Giving
    • Why Partner with CDFIs
    • Invest in CDFIs
    • Invest Through OFN
    • Investor Resources
  • Members
    • Join OFN
    • CDFI Connect Community
    • Take Action
  • Public Policy
    • Partnering with the Public Sector
    • U.S. Treasury CDFI Fund
    • Public Policy Communications
    • Take Action
  • Initiatives
    • Current Initiatives
      • CDFI Community Investment Fund
      • Economic Justice Partnership Fund
      • Finance Justice Fund
      • Good to Grow CDFI Investment Fund
      • Grow with Google Small Business Fund
      • Native CDFI Awards
      • Ned Gramlich Award
    • Past Initiatives
  • About
    • About OFN
    • Mission & Vision
    • Our Team
    • OFN Board
    • OFN Training & Events
    • OFN Careers
    • OFN Financials
    • Contact Us
  • Resources
    • Blog
    • Press Room
    • CDFI Locator
    • CDFI Industry Job Bank
    • CDFI Resource Library
    • Public Appearances
    • CDFI History
    • About CDFIs for Clients

Quick Links

  • CDFI Locator
  • Blog
  • OFN Training & Events
  • Join
  • CDFI Connect Community
Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union
15th
May
2017
New York, NY

Trusted Credit Union Expands Access to Financial Literacy

May 15, 2017

Client: Various

Client Location: New York, NY

CDFI: Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union

CDFI Service Area: NY

CDFI Services Provided: 

Financing

Financial and Social Impact

  • LESFCU has reinvested $77 million, making it the largest community development credit union in New York City

“I was walking down Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard one day and had in mind to open a bank account. I saw Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union and became a member,” says Steward Mitchell, a Harlem resident at the time. That was 2010, and he says, ever since, “It’s been very good to me. I’ve opened a checking and savings account, and the credit union’s financial counseling and planning programs helped me start a budget and a plan. They’re great people; they really care.”

Steward is one of approximately 20,000 people across New York City, from mostly low-income and immigrant communities, who have found a financial home at LESPFCU in the credit union’s 30 years of existence. In this time, the CDFI has reinvested more than $77 million into the community in the form of loans, and mobilized more than $30 million in local savings.

“We provide a very wide range of products and services—savings, checking, and money market accounts, CDs, consumer and business loans, credit cards, and mortgages for low-income housing co-ops,” says Linda Levy, LESPFCU’s CEO. “From the very beginning, we’ve tried be a full service financial institution alternative to commercial banks so that our members would not feel like they are getting second rate services.”

Currently, New York City’s largest community development credit union operates three branches in Manhattan’s Lower East Side and East and Central Harlem. It also runs an innovative full-service mobile bus branch that travels from borough to borough and features two offices, an ATM, and a teller window.

This footprint is about to grow. The CDFI is expanding in three neighborhoods—Manhattan’s East Harlem; Staten Island’s North Shore; and Jackson Heights in Queens—where there is great need for responsible financial services, loans, and education.

The expansion comes in response to community demand, which is partly determined through the mobile branch. Linda explains, “Community groups ask us to bring the bus to them, and if it’s a right fit we do. For example, we have been bringing the mobile branch to Staten Island for a year. It’s enabled us to determine what the needs are and identify the community’s commitment to what we offer.”

LESPFCU expects to set up a permanent location in Staten Island and establish a storefront in East Harlem, as well as increase its presence in Jackson Heights. Says Linda, “With this expansion we expect to provide affordable financial services to more than 10,000 members in NYC and finance over $5 million in loans for affordable housing, debt consolidation, immigration relief, credit building, and other consumer needs.”

Tags: Credit Building, Education, Predatory Lending, Technical Assistance, Unbanked/Underbanked Borrowers, Urban

Share post to Facebook
Share post to Twitter
Share post to LinkedIn

Opportunity Finance logo - white

  • About OFN
  • Contact Us
  • Blog
  • OFN Training & Events
  • Newsletter Subscription
  • CDFI Locator
  • Invest in CDFIs
  • CDFI Connect Community
  • CDFI Industry Job Bank
  • Press Room

Copyright © 2023 Opportunity Finance Network. All rights reserved.

  • Terms of Use
  • Sitemap