By Claire Carlson for The Daily Yonder.
Broadcast version by Nadia Ramlagan for Tennessee News Service reporting for The Daily Yonder-Public News Service Collaboration

Expanding economic opportunities to rural areas in the Deep South is at the forefront of the work of the most recent recipient of a prestigious annual award that honors the achievements of individuals making long-lasting community contributions.

The recipient, William (Bill) Bynum, received the Heinz Award for the Economy for his work with HOPE Credit Union, a full-service financial institution with branches in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. HOPE serves low-wealth communities that don't have access to the tools for financial success.

"The jurors gravitated towards candidates whose work has the potential for 'generational reverberations'," said Kim O'Dell, director of the Heinz Awards. "They noted Mr. Bynum's commitment to improving economic opportunities by moving capital to historically marginalized populations as well as the scale and replicability of his work."

The Heinz Family Foundation honors several individuals each year for their contributions to the arts, environment, public policy, human condition, and economy. The award was started in 1993 by Teresa Heinz to honor people working in the fields most valued by her late husband, H. John Heinz III, who represented Pennsylvania in the U.S. House and Senate.

"Mr. Bynum has an unwavering commitment to improving the lives of others," said O'Dell. "His work personifies Senator John Heinz's belief that people have the power and responsibility to make the world a better place."

Many of the members of HOPE are first time users of a traditional bank.

"Almost half of our members didn't have a bank account before they joined the credit union," said Bynum. "They relied on high-cost check cashers and payday lenders who take advantage of those who can least afford to pay."

HOPE opens branches in communities with low capital to stimulate the local economy and improve financial conditions for people who have not been able to accumulate savings or assets because of generational wealth extraction by entities like predatory loan companies. HOPE works to provide people the ability to get out of debt, improve their quality of life, become home and business-owners, and influence economic policy.

To Bynum, these initiatives are key to advancing economic justice for disenfranchised communities.

"In a country that is increasingly diverse, we can't leave the majority of the population on the outside of the economy," said Bynum. "It undermines the stability of the entire economy and it is counter to our collective interest."

Between April 2020 and April 2021, HOPE issued over 5,000 Paycheck Protection Program loans that allowed businesses to retain their employees during the pandemic.

According to Bynum, HOPE issued loans to businesses unable to obtain paycheck protection loans through the banks they already had existing relationships with. Many of these were Black-owned small businesses that were less likely to receive loans through traditional banking institutions, according to a recently released case study from Purdue University and Harvard Business School on the Paycheck Protection Program. If these businesses did receive them, it was from nonbank lenders like fintechs, which provide loans online.

The loans distributed by HOPE kept Black-owned businesses afloat during a time when they were facing closures at an extremely high rate: 41% of all Black-owned businesses in the United States closed between February and April of 2020, according to a report by the House Committee on Small Business.

"Each of those loans helps stabilize jobs in very low-income communities," said Bynum. "We were in a very fortunate position to extend the lifeline to these entrepreneurs. "

HOPE has also initiated a Transformational Deposit program. This program imports capital into wealth-starved communities through deposits funded by individuals, institutional depositors, financial advisors, banks, and any other entity willing to participate in the program.

Unlike traditional banks that use the funds from their customers' low or no-cost checking and savings accounts for loans, accounts with HOPE do not have enough funds to draw from to provide loans to local businesses and initiatives like housing and healthcare. Instead, this money needs to be brought in from elsewhere. In spring of 2020, Netflix made a $10 million deposit, and companies like Dick's Sporting Goods and Paypal followed suit.

"We've raised over $100 million in transformational deposits in the past year, which enables us to finance a lot of homes, small businesses, grocery stores, schools, and health centers across the rural Deep South," said Bynum.

It is accomplishments like these that drove the Heinz Family Foundation to present Bynum with the Heinz Award.

"The enormity and timeliness of the issues Mr. Bynum addresses made it critically important to celebrate his work," said O'Dell.

Included in the award is an unrestricted $250,000. Bynum plans to use some of the money to further the work at HOPE, with a portion of it already allocated to the institution's policy center. He also hopes to build an endowment that would enable HOPE to take the voices of the people they serve and ensure their perspectives are considered when policymakers decide how to allocate resources.

"It's certainly an incredible honor to be associated with the Heinz family and they've given me an opportunity to dream a bit about how to best put the resources to work," said Bynum.

To read The Daily Yonder's full interview with Bynum, click here.

Claire Carlson wrote this article for The Daily Yonder.


get more stories like this via email

April is Financial Literacy Month, when the focus is on learning smart money habits but also how to protect yourself from fraud.

One problem on the rise in the Southeast is the "impostor" scam, when scammers represent themselves as fake government agents or bogus businesses. They are really on the prowl for your cash and personal info, costing victims in North Carolina almost $190 million last year alone.

Natalya Rice, Southeast Regional attorney for the Federal Trade Commission, listed some key red flags to look out for.

"Utilizing a payment app, sometimes even cryptocurrency, things like that," Rice noted. "Anyone who contacts you from what seems like it could be a legitimate company or business, if they're asking you to send them money or some type of payment through one of these type of payment methods, that is a red flag that you're dealing with a scammer."

Other warning signs include requests to transfer your funds or even demands for a verification code to access an account. If you have concerns, Rice advised it is best to stop communication and contact the actual company directly. Still other scams big in the Southeast include online shopping, investments and job offers.

Nationwide, a record $10 billion was lost to scams in 2023.

More than 25,000 North Carolina residents reported possible identity theft last year. Rice recommends acting promptly when you realize or suspect you have been scammed. The first step is to contact your financial institution and report the incident to its fraud department. She added it is crucial to notify federal and state agencies for further investigation.

"You can go to reportfraud.ftc.gov and fill out a report there and let us know what happened," Rice noted. "In the state of North Carolina, there's also another place you'll want to report it to, and that's the North Carolina Attorney General's Office."

If you suspect your identity has been compromised, Rice stressed the FTC can assist you in developing a recovery plan. She added getting your money back is never guaranteed but the sooner a scam is reported, the sooner it can be investigated and other people can be warned.


get more stories like this via email

Advocates are cheering the General Assembly for legislation protecting Marylanders' data privacy and are calling on Gov. Wes Moore to sign the bill.

The Maryland Online Privacy Protection Act of 2024 would limit data collection by tech companies as well as their ability to bury unfavorable terms in complex license agreements.

R.J. Cross, director of the Don't Sell My Data Campaign for the Public Interest Research Group, said the new law is a win for consumers.

"No one reads those long privacy policies. They're often vague and full of legalese and so, hiding what a company wants to do with your data there is pretty duplicitous and not being consumer friendly," Cross contended. "The Maryland law takes a very different approach and said it's not enough; you can't just hide things in your fine print. You need to have good data practices that protect people upfront."

She pointed out the Maryland law would be one of the strongest in the nation. If Gov. Moore signs the bill, it would go into effect in October 2025.

The bill gives consumers the right to have some personal data deleted and places limits on the kind of widespread monitoring used to generate targeted advertising. Cross noted such data collection is common.

"A lot of our favorite websites and apps are gathering things like what you've searched for online, every website you visited, your location, maybe even your entire phone contact list," Cross outlined. "It has turned around and sold that information to companies that you've probably never even heard of."

With data breaches consistently making news, Cross added the bill will improve Marylanders' personal security.

"A lot of what this will do is limit how much data is being collected about you and sold, which will help your personal security in a big way," Cross explained. "The more data that companies collect about you, and the more they sell it to other companies, the more likely it's going to be exposed in a breach or a hack."


get more stories like this via email

Florida residents can now file their simple income-tax forms for free and save time through the Internal Revenue Service's Direct File pilot program. It's estimated the simplified filing process could eventually save Florida taxpayers more than $530 million in filing fees every year.

With the April 15 income-tax filing deadline right around the corner, Adam Ruben, vice president for campaigns and political strategy at the Economic Security Project, said you can easily use the program by visiting the website Directfile.IRS.gov.

"It's an interview-based questionnaire," Ruben said. "So it's something that people can use on their phones on their computers available in English and Spanish that asks people questions and pretty much plain language, and you fill in the answers. And it fills in the tax form for you."

Florida is one of a dozen states where IRS Direct File is a pilot project. If it were to expand nationwide and be available to more taxpayers, Ruben estimated that within five years, it could save Americans $8 billion in tax-preparation fees and another $3 billion worth of time annually.

However, opponents have argued that the government is wasting resources and will snag business from professional tax preparers and programs that have lobbied against Direct File.

Chris Moreno, director of financial capability for Catalyst Miami, a nonprofit that works with communities through a variety of free services, said a stress-free filing process that can be done from the comfort of your home or the convenience of your phone is worth taking advantage of.

"If you are an average worker who gets a W-2 - you're employed for a company, you don't own any companies or businesses - you'd probably be the ideal candidate for someone to be able to use Direct File this year," Moreno said.

While a free-file program has been available, many taxpayers were unaware they had access to it. An investigation by ProPublica revealed tactics by Intuit, maker of TurboTax, to cloud the free-file program.

And state auditors, comptrollers and treasurers in 18 states - including Florida - sent a letter in March to the federal government urging the termination of Direct File. They claimed it might lead to confusion about state tax filings, potentially resulting in penalties and loss of state refunds.


get more stories like this via email