Henry Jimenez and LEDC clients are recognized in the Bush Foundation’s 2022 BMagazine
About 346,000 Latinos live, work and raise families in Minnesota and the number only grows. LEDC’s services and CDFI standing aims to help “minnesotanos” not only live here, but to take ownership and truly call the state home.
In an interview with Patrick Condon for the Bush Foundation, Henry Jimenez, executive director, elaborates “…we’re helping develop and expand Latino culture. And it’s important for us to clarify that’s not just Latino culture. It’s Minnesota culture, moving forward.”
Latinos are socially and economically significant to Minnesota’s future, Condon’s article discusses how this solidified the relationship between the Bush Foundation and LEDC. Beginning in 2017, LEDC was selected for the Community Innovation Award showing themselves as a unique small business service provider and as a capable CDFI, as described “[LEDC’s loans] are important at a time when place-based CDFIs have been on the decline.”
In 2020 and 2021, LEDC shifted to emergency services and came together with other organizations seeing disproportionate federal and local aid coming to communities hit hardest by the pandemic and social unrest.
The Rebuild & Heal MN Initiative was founded: African Development Center, African Economic Development Solutions CAIR-MN, the local chapter of Council on American-Islamic Relations. The Bush Foundation acted in response to business owners needing to make payroll and rent and repair other damages. They adapted modes of dispersing funds with trust to those working directly in the community. Ramla Bile, grantmaking officer, reflects “We knew that to respond to the challenges of the moment, we needed to be flexible and focused on immediate impact.”
The article features onsite visits with business owners like Alejandro Gutierrez of Moler Barber School. Business Development Lead Rico Duran translated and facilitated at Mercado Central with other business owners Jose Zavaleta of Sastreria don Jose and Marcos and Luisa Hernández of Cocina San Marcos. stating, “I think we would have closed without [the aid]…you guys cared for us ”
LEDC is grateful to the Bush Foundation again to giving visibility to the work of LEDC’s executive director, Henry Jimenez, our clients and all that LEDC does to keep “minnesotanos” at home.
