Blogs

On Wednesday, November 19th, MAF convened it’s first “Charla Financiera” or Financial Talk about the Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) process at Centro del Pueblo in the Mission. The event featured IRS speakers, Xavier Guerrero and Patrick Brown, ACORN representative Graciela Reyna and Ricardo Calderon from CARECEN. The event convened community members and experts as well as community organizations in an effort to provide crucial and needed information about the ITIN application process, benefits and the resources available to help people obtain the ITIN.

As MAF helps individuals to asset build and save, it recognized the ITIN as the paramount gateway activity to increase participation in the financial mainstream. Obtaining the ITIN is the first step towards gaining financial stability for many working-class Latino immigrants who don’t qualify for a social security number; with an ITIN they can access mainstream financial services for cheaper fees.

Nancy Kaufman is a bi-lingual Latina that operates an event planning business called Balloon Art Productions and Rental. Nancy was operating her business out of her home and decided that she needed to expand her operations. She received small business technical assistance from the Mission Economic Development Agency and attended small business classes at ALAS (Alternativas Para Latinas En Autosuficiencia). It was at ALAS that she met other women interested in starting their own micro-enterprises. Nancy and her new colleagues attended MAF's Orientación Sobre Como Formar Cooperativas. Nancy quickly decided that she was ready to convert her sole proprietor business into a worker owner cooperative and invited her new friends to join her. I assisted the women in creating the organizational and legal structure for for their cooperative. Gabrielle Lessard from the Insight Center for Community Economic Development provided the legal oversight for the development of the operating agreement.

Social Compact found that 44% of all families in the Mission District have no credit histories. Without credit, Mission families are locked out of the credit market all together, forced to turn to high-cost, predatory lenders for their financial needs.

Part of my work at MAF focuses on the promotion of limited equity cooperative housing in the Mission. I am working in coordination with the San Francisco Community Land Trust to promote cooperatives to low-income tenants in the Mission. The SFCLT is currently forming a limited equity cooperative at 53 Columbus in Chinatown. The project is the only one in the country where the community land trust (CLT) model is being used to prevent the displacement of low-income working class people. In addition, the ground floor of the building will become the new home of the Asian Law Caucus.

El Tecolote recently featured El Fondo Popular, where Francisco Barradas describes our mission, programs and services. To read the full article go to Opening Financial Doors.