The tangible community impact of a CDFI can be very visible, simply by seeing the physical childcare buildings, revitalized housing options and vibrant community centers, but many don’t know what CDFI stands for. They are not aware of the daily, behind-the-scenes work they do or how they do it.
CDFI stands for a community development financial institution. These organizations provide financial funds, resources and connections to communities that other mainstream financial institutions don’t traditionally reach.
In the Midwest, the largest CDFI is
IFF, a nonprofit CDFI that aims to lift up nonprofits within communities across Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Milwaukee, and St. Louis.
They provide community-centered lending, development, and real estate consulting to under-resourced people within urban, suburban, and rural communities. Many of these communities don’t have access to capital through typical financial markets, but when a CDFI steps in, their impact is profound.
By utilizing a public-private partnership model, CDFIs leverage over $12 in private capital for every $1 in federal support. Addressing this credit gap provides real opportunities and a platform for upcoming businesses, housing developments, community facilities, jobs, and revitalization of neighborhoods.
IFF has provided more than $1.8 billion in flexible, affordable financing to nonprofits across housing, health care, education, community development, and arts and culture sectors. These dollars have enabled more than 43 million square feet of real estate, 16,000 child care slots, 160,000 school seats, 788,000 new patient visits, and 21,000 units of affordable housing.
The Chicago-headquartered institution expanded offices to Ohio, with Columbus in 2016, followed by Cleveland in 2023. IFF’s reach also includes
Cincinnati, having provided 22 loans to 15 clients, totaling more than $15 million to customers including Kennedy Heights Art Center, Findlay Market, Santa Maria Community Services, Seven Hills Neighborhood Houses, Rosemary’s Babies and more.
Scott Hackenberg, IFF's managing director of lending for the eastern region at IFF, works to find, vet, and underwrite loans for borrowers in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana. He manages a team of folks who develop relationships with nonprofits and organizations that are doing impactful work locally.
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Natalie GrilliScott Hackenberg, IFF, speaks at the ribbon cutting ceremony for Rosemary's Babies on March 30, 2025.
“I worked in banking for a long period of time, and even in banking, people wouldn’t understand what a CDFI was,” he says. “The way I describe it is that we’re a nonprofit lender that makes loans to other nonprofits and organizations that are making a demonstrable impact in their neighborhoods and communities. We are like a bank in the sense that we do make loans, however, because we’re a CDFI nonprofit, we don’t have the volume of regulatory oversight in what we do like a bank does. Sometimes we can do things a bank can’t do, or we can compliment the work they can do, to help improve the community. That provides flexibility to do a lot of different kinds of things.”
At IFF, Hackenberg works with nonprofits who are looking to make facilities acquisitions, do renovations or complete projects that require capital they don’t have. IFF works with the organizations to provide the right sized loans, develop relationships, and work with them throughout the loan process, and even post-funding for possible follow-up transactions and financings with existing borrowers.
The Cleveland area native previously spent time in the CDFI space in California, and has been proudly working with IFF for about six months, feeling passionate about returning to his hometown to make a difference.
“We were in Cincinnati recently and had the opportunity to go visit with some of our borrowers,” he says. “It’s so inspiring to see the work that they do, how hard they work, how passionate they are about the work, how important the work is for Cincinnati and the surrounding areas.”
Meeting the real folks and namesakes behind the vital missions of nonprofits like Arlene Nolan of
Shelterhouse and Rosemary Oglesby-Henry of
Rosemary’s Babies, has been moving for Hackenberg.
Rosemary’s Babies is a teen parent and family support organization, whose mission is to help teen parents master the concepts of self-leadership to leave a legacy and become contributors to their city and community.
“Rosemary’s journey is just amazing, but even the journey that IFF took alongside Rosemary in getting the project funded and off-the-ground with the renovations done was incredible,” he says.
IFF guides borrowers on buying contractor’s insurance and protecting capital throughout the course of the project. Even after the project is complete, IFF maintains relationships, understanding the value of connections.
“We’re providing money, but there’s so much more than just funding,” Hackenberg says. “We were attached at-the-hip with Rosemary through this whole process. Her passion drove this project through to completion, even with all the hurdles she had to overcome. There was a lot of resistance in the North Avondale neighborhood to the plans that she had, and we were there to help support that effort as well. We were able to share that message to the neighborhood and community that what she was going to do would be beneficial not only to those young mothers, but also beneficial to that neighborhood as well.”
Rosemary’s Babies celebrated the ribbon cutting of their 6,900-square-foot facility on March 30, 2025, in Cincinnati. Founder Rosemary grew up not far from where the
Holloway House and Resource Center stands today, in Avondale, a community with one of the highest gun violence and poverty rates in Hamilton County.
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Natalie GrilliRosemary Oglesby-Henry cuts the ribbon for Rosemary's Babies, a teen parent and family support organization in the North Avondale neighborhood of Cincinnati.
Seeing the project come to fruition was exciting for Hackenberg, too.
“Every single inch of that three-story renovated house is just so thoughtfully done,” he says. “Every room could be a page in a magazine, all of the furniture, knickknacks, custom paintings and murals are all just remarkable.”
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Natalie GrilliRosemary's Babies has served over 300 teens a year with virtual and in-person support.
Rosemary Oglesby-Henry is the CEO of Rosemary’s Babies, which opened its doors in 2016, serving over 300 teens a year with virtual and in-person support.
“From 2016 to 2021, we provided resources for teen parents — everything from emergency supplies, car seats to the hospitals after deliveries, parenting education and advocacy for awareness on supporting teen parents, as well as preventing teen pregnancy,” Oglesby-Henry says. “Around the time of COVID, we learned that more than 35% of the teens we were serving in greater Cincinnati were homeless.”
Due to the local demand, the organization decided to shift and adapt to provide a hyper-local solution. Through the Port Authority of Greater Cincinnati, they got a property that was dormant for almost 15 years. Through an introduction by the Greater Cincinnati Foundation, Rosemary’s Babies was introduced to IFF.
“We were looking for funding, and the Port required us to have 100% of our support before we could purchase the property,” she says. “They wanted us to raise $1 million, so we talked with IFF because they have a history of supporting organizations that are small or wanting to scale who might not have the significant years or capital to be able to do it alone. IFF stepped in to support us with that acquisition, giving us a $900,000 line of credit with an interest rate we could afford, and terms that would allow our organization to be able to complete the project.”
That support was provided in 2022, and just last month, the revitalized 6,900-square foot building held a ribbon-cutting ceremony and community open house. On March 30, visitors received tours of the spaces, which include a library, a spa area, a state-of-the-art lab, children’s educational spaces, and housing for up to seven moms or 14 individuals total for up to two years. This Holloway House Aid Program for Teen Moms and Babies provides housing, financial security, safety, stability, and health for families.
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Natalie GrilliInvestors and community came together to celebrate at the ribbon cutting ceremony for Rosemary's Babies on March 30, 2025.
“Our building sits in the middle of North Avondale, which is highly populated and high income, and on the cusp of Avondale, which has a high poverty rate, crime rate, and high generational rate of pregnancy and poverty,” she says. “We sit at the center of all 52 neighborhoods, so we can serve all of greater Cincinnati, Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.”
Oglesby-Henry says she values the partnership with IFF, and appreciates the education provided on insurance, bonds, and extra protection they provided throughout the process. Even after terminating the general contractor, the project still was able to be completed in just over two years.
“We cannot say enough about the support that IFF has given us,” she says. “As a smaller organization, the protections that they had us put in place, and the education they provided along the way navigating the development process as a new organization — we were able to continue to move forward, with support from the city, IFF, and our partners.”
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Natalie GrilliKelly Cook and Scott Hackenberg of IFF, joined Rosemary Oglesby-Henry to see the unveiling of the renovated center at Rosemary's Babies.
Seeing her vision for Rosemary’s Babies grow from an idea in a thesis statement during her master’s program at Mount St. Joseph University, to a real life home for families, has been a full-circle moment. The grand opening is a validation for this mother who was also a teen mom, labeled by society as a failure.
“It also shows these teen parents and young people that there are people that are out there rooting for you not to fail,” she says. “They see something in the trajectory of all their futures and built you a place you can go where you won’t be judged, and it’s all yours. It’s okay to dream big, because had I not dreamed big, this would have never happened.”
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Natalie GrilliThe 6,900-square-foot facility of the Holloway House and Resource Center includes library, a spa area, a state-of-the-art lab, children’s educational spaces and housing.
This leader feels humbled knowing the inspiration her organization provides for the next generation of dreamers and doers by encouraging positive self-talk, respect, integrity, and a sense of trust. She hopes to challenge kids to become leaders, and truly change generations, raising leaders who lift up their communities.
“They don’t have to be a part, a subset or a consequence of what’s going on in their community,” she says. “They can be the cause of what’s going on, leading to big things like trying to change trajectories and building organizations like Rosemary’s Babies.”
Hackenberg says IFF’s investment in Cincinnati is possible because of the welcoming collaboration within the city. Partnering with organizations including the
Cincinnati Development Fund,
The Model Group,
NewPath, and
Greater Cincinnati Foundation, has prompted IFF to brainstorm how to collectively impact neighborhoods and communities here.
Luke Blocher is the chief strategy officer and general counsel at Cincinnati Development Fund. He has been in the role for about two and a half years, after working in community and economic development in Cincinnati for the past ten years.
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Luke Blocher is the chief strategy officer and general counsel for Cincinnati Development Fund (CDF).“We step in for the things that aren’t necessarily going to be supported by private capital markets,” Blocher says. “A CDFI raises impact capital from the federal government, local banks and philanthropic organizations.”
While the Cincinnati Development Fund (CDF) is local to the area, deeply embedded in the markets and people here,
working with IFF has enabled their collective impact to expand. IFF’s and CDF’s collaboration dates back to 2015.
“Because we’re working together, we can be more aggressive and ambitious in trying to help, particularly in this partnership — nonprofit facilities get built, renovated, and invested in — in a way that wouldn’t be possible on our own to the same scale,” Blocher says.
Together, the pair partnered on revitalizing the oldest operating public market in Ohio, the
Findlay Market in Over-the-Rhine. The loans helped to construct the facility and enhance the vibrancy of the surrounding small business ecosystem. They also helped fund the
Kennedy Heights Art Center, in the outer ring of the city which was historically disinvested in, says Blocher.
Traditionally, CDF does not do nonprofit facility investment, but coupled with IFF’s real estate expertise, the pair came together for the project. Blocher says CDF has since expanded its scope to include more nonprofit projects like funding murals and cultural institutions in the historic Walnut Hills neighborhood; revitalizing areas have been brought back to life through these collaborative investments.
“It’s really rewarding and exciting to feel like you’re a part of that revitalization, as places get better, people’s lives improve as a result,” he says. “This industry, our organization, IFF, and other people like us — we really play an essential role in the vibrancy of any community.”
As market uncertainty increases, the demand for CDFIs does as well. When community-based organizations struggle to access capital through typical financial markets, CDFIs can help navigate the situation and provide local solutions to local problems.
“We don’t do everything, but we do the things that are the hardest to do, and the things that wouldn’t happen without CDFIs,” Blocher says. “Without CDFIs, something would be lost in those neighborhoods and communities. We really feel proud of the work and these investments that can change neighborhoods.”
Block by Block is a solutions journalism series that is supported by IFF, CEDAM and Invest Detroit, and is focused on community development leaders and initiatives in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana.