Newsline: BBT members, clients invest $700,000 in low-income communities

[CoBNews <CoBNews@brethren.org>]

Newsline: Church of the Brethren News Service, News Director Cheryl 
Brumbaugh-Cayford, 800-323-8039 ext. 260, cobnews@brethren.org

BBT members, clients invest $700,000 in low-income communities

(Jan. 12, 2012) Elgin, IL -- From soup kitchens to small businesses in the US 
and abroad, Brethren Benefit Trust's member and client assets are making a 
positive impact on projects that serve low-income areas. In 2011, Brethren 
Pension Plan members and Brethren Foundation clients provided $735,776 in loans 
to projects that serve the needs of at-risk communities through BBT's Community 
Development Investment Fund (CDIF).

"Our members and clients should celebrate the support they're offering to 
qualified community development institutions around the world through the 
CDIF," said BBT president Nevin Dulabaum. "This fund reflects the Brethren 
principle of mutuality, and those who place assets in this fund are helping 
low-income communities grow stronger and enriching people's lives."

BBT member and client assets invested in the CDIF are used to purchase 
Community Investment Notes at a fixed interest rate through Calvert Foundation. 
These notes are used to provide loans in the areas of community development, 
affordable housing, microcredit, and small business development.

In total, Calvert Foundation reported that BBT member and client assets helped 
build or rehabilitate 13 affordable housing units and financed three 
not-for-profit organizations, cooperatives, or social innovations in 2011. CDIF 
assets also funded 120 new enterprises and created 175 new jobs in 2011. 

Through Calvert Foundation, the CDIF supports projects like Boston Community 
Capital, an organization that buys foreclosed properties and resells them to 
the original owners--often with reduced mortgages. A Calvert Foundation 
borrower provided $7 million of its tax credit allocation to support expansion 
of St. John's Bread and Life, a Brooklyn soup kitchen and nutritional 
counseling center, so that it could serve a total of 450,000 meals annually. 
Internationally, investments in the CDIF help projects like KREDIT, a small 
loans provider that helps support entrepreneurs in Cambodia.

Pension Plan members and Brethren Foundation clients who are interested in 
investing in the CDIF are encouraged to allocate no more than one percent of 
their portfolio to this fund. For more information, Brethren Foundation clients 
should contact Steve Mason, director, at 800-746-1505 ext. 369, or at 
smason@cobbt.org . Brethren Pension Plan members should contact John Carroll, 
manager of Pension Operations, at 800-746-1505 ext. 383 or jcarroll@cobbt.org .

The Church of the Brethren is a Christian denomination committed to continuing 
the work of Jesus peacefully and simply, and to living out its faith in 
community. The denomination is based in the Anabaptist and Pietist faith 
traditions and is one of the three Historic Peace Churches. It celebrated its 
300th anniversary in 2008. It counts some 123,000 members across the United 
States and Puerto Rico, and has missions and sister churches in Nigeria, 
Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and India.

(Brian Solem, publications coordinator for Brethren Benefit Trust, provided 
this release.)

># # #

>For more information contact:

>Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford
>Director of News Services
>Church of the Brethren
>1451 Dundee Ave., Elgin, IL 60120
>800-323-8039 ext. 260
>cobnews@brethren.org