HOW WE STARTED
After Southern Arizona community leaders determined that a nonprofit loan fund was needed and advisable, the Nonprofit Loan Fund of Tucson and Southern Arizona (NPLF) held its first organizational meeting in April, 2012.
We appointed a board of directors, officers, and a loan committee and the board hired a consultant and an attorney to ensure that NPLF would be a well-governed organization that could deploy investor money wisely. NPLF became a supporting organization of the Community Foundation for Southern Arizona (CFSA), and we partnered with Business Development Finance Corporation (BDFC) to provide loan operations support.
We are grateful for the foresight of NPLF founders Helaine Levy of the Diamond Foundation, Clint Mabie of Community Foundation for Southern Arizona, and Tony Penn of the United Way of Tucson and Southern Arizona. We also appreciate the role Jim Click played in convening early supporters, and CFSA’s back-office support was invaluable.
The NPLF board hired Maura Grogan as its first part-time Loan Director in June, 2014. She came with strong banking and nonprofit management experience and significantly expanded NPLF’s marketing, conducted all underwriting, and began providing informal ad hoc technical assistance for borrowers and other nonprofits.