Invest in New England Agenda
Invest in New England Agenda
11:00-11:30 am Gathering and Registration, Connolly Center
11:30-11:50 am Welcome and Opening, Connolly Center
11:50-12:30 pm Buffet Lunch and Regional Connections, Connolly Center
12:30-2:00 pm Explore: It's Happening Here, Connolly Center
Foundations across New England are pushing the envelope and are leveraging their endowments to make place-based impact investments. After all, their money came from the community; shouldn’t it be reinvested in the community? In this session, we will hear from some early adopters of impact investing, learn how they got into the work, and see examples of New England investments.
Speakers: Ricky Bogert, Mark Hayles, Lawrence Miller, Geeta Pradhan, Maggie Sandoval, Janice St. Onge and Joe Williams
2:00-2:15 pm Coffee Break, The Bridge
2:15-3:15 pm Unlock: Practical Steps to Moving Foundation Money, Connolly Center
Becoming a place-based impact investor may seem complicated, but leading foundations have identified the steps. It needs policies and processes, a bought-in board, and a staff willing to experiment with different ways of creating impact. This session will identify ways foundations become impact investors by examining how three New England peers built or are building impact investing programs.
Speakers: Stratton Lloyd, Thomas Mitchell, Lisa Owens and Jeff Rosen
3:15-3:30 pm Break
3:30-4:30 pm Explore and Unlock Concurrent Sessions
Case Study Deep Dive: Greater New Haven’s Mission Investments Company
Concord Room, 4th floor
The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven seeded the creation of a new subsidiary—Mission Investment Company—to provide technical assistance and loans, equity, and guarantees to local entrepreneurs. Eight years into the experiment, staff will share what they have learned from their work to create an ecosystem that supports diverse entrepreneurs, community groups and organizations that support inclusive growth.
Speakers: Drew Alden, Stephen Snider and Joe Williams
Governance for Place-Based Impact Investing: Committee, Policy, and Fiduciary Duty
Montgomery Room, 4th floor
The Elmina B. Sewall Foundation started their impact investing exploration in 2009 and made their first investment in 2011. Today, Sewall seeks to invest 10% of assets in and around Maine while deploying their entire portfolio in values-aligned strategies. The process of getting there, though, was not easy and included a deep exploration of the work by staff and board. In this session a current staffer and former board member of Sewall will talk through the steps the foundation took to adopting its impact investing strategy.
Speakers: Betsy Biemann, Pierre Joseph and Thomas Mitchell
Resourcing Impact Investing: Talking With Staff About What’s Required
Connolly Center, 4th floor
Big barriers to adopting place-based impact investment programs are concerns over staff capacity and the skills required to source and assess potential transactions. This session will be an opportunity to engage with impact investment staff at two foundations and discuss what’s essential and what’s not for a foundation that is thinking about deploying capital.
Speakers: Ricky Bogert, Lubna Maria Elia, Lawrence Miller and Janice St. Onge
4:30-4:45 pm Break
4:45-5:00 pm Closing Takeaways, Connolly Center
5:00-6:00 pm Reception, Harborside Dining Room, 31st Floor
8:00-8:45 am Buffet Breakfast, Connolly Center
8:45-9:45 am Deploy: New England's Deployment Ecosystem, Connolly Center
Impact investing does not happen in isolation. Communities need capital, but they also need a flourishing capital ecosystem of entrepreneurs, financially savvy nonprofits, capital aggregators, capital enablers, and others. In this session we will take stock of New England’s capital deployment ecosystem and identify how new impact investors plug in and strengthen that ecosystem.
Speakers: Betsy Biemann, Betty Francisco, Lourdes Germaine, Pierre Joseph, and Lisa Richter
9:45-10:00 am Break and Center for Social Innovation Posters, Connolly Center
10:00-11:00 am Deploy Concurrent Sessions
Accepting Risk to Achieve Impact
Connolly Center, 4th floor
At some point in the adoption of impact investment programs, foundations need to have a deep discussion about risk and impact. For foundations looking to make catalytic investments, making investments when others won’t means shouldering some investment risk or perceived investment risk. Where traditional investors shy away, impact investors can find tremendous opportunity to make a difference.
Speakers: Mark Paley, Jeff Rosen and Janice St. Onge
Yes, You Can Invest Next Door
Rosengren Center, 4th floor
Capital and markets do not stop at county lines or state borders, and yet narrow definitions of service areas by foundations can be overly restrictive when it comes to making New England’s impact investment ecosystem serve New England’s communities. In this session we will discuss the idea of regionalism and how broader conceptions of service areas when investing can make a greater impact.
Speakers: Lubna Maria Elia, Lawrence Miller, Lisa Richter and Rob Riley
Good Impact Investing Needs Grants Too
Montgomery Room, 4th floor
Impact investors are increasingly pursuing “integrated capital” approaches that blend investment and grant dollars to create a more flexible continuum of capital tools to support critical community investments. This session will be an opportunity to discuss examples of integrated capital investments and ways foundations might adopt this strategy to serve their mission.
Speakers: Betty Francisco, Tory Dietel Hopps, and Stephen Snider
11:00-11:15 am Coffee Break and Center for Social Innovation Posters, Connolly Center
11:15-12:30 pm Deploy: Let's Collaborate to Invest in New England, Connolly Center
In our closing session, we will have the opportunity to collaboratively design our next steps for increasing the number of philanthropic place-based impact investors, growing the amount of capital committed to impact investments in New England, and expand and deepen the measurable community impact from impact investing.