If the Occupy Wall Street folks ever decide to pursue an action plan, they might want to look at what Communities Creating Opportunities, more commonly known as CCO, is doing in Kansas City. Especially in Missouri, CCO and its partners are providing a welcome counterweight to the cash-heavy special interests which drive so much of what takes place in state government.
January 23, 2012 | Kansas City Star
Community partnership springs up as an experiment for some of those who might fall into “a debt trap.”
January 23, 2012 | KCTV5 News
The Fair Community Credit Group, a Kansas City nonprofit group, is now offering an alternative. They are a group of churches, bankers, lawyers and nonprofit agencies planning to offer small loans.
January 23, 2012 | FOX 4 News
The non-profit group Communities Creating Opportunity is helping establish a fair community credit agency in Kansas City. It would compete with payday lenders but charge 36 percent interest instead of the triple-digit rates that payday lenders impose.
January 19, 2012 | Kansas City Star
A petition drive supported by religious congregations and other groups is seeking a statewide vote to clamp down on the predatory short-term lending businesses that are rampant in Missouri. And by the looks of the Anthony & Middlebrook letter, the industry is running scared.
June 7, 2011
The following piece was written by CCO leader and Saint Paul School of Theology seminary student, Orlando Gallardo. He is speaking from his faith, as a Christian, while reflecting on the role that faith leaders can and should play in the immigration debate. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Orlando Gallardo. When we were meeting about [...]
May 7, 2011
The St. Anthony Catholic parish organizing committee, in partnership with the Scarritt Renaissance neighborhood, demonstrated the incredible power a community wieldswhen neighbors come together for a common cause. The St. Anthony Catholic parish is a member of Communities Creating Opportunity. After repeatedly hearing concerns about blighted buildings in the neighborhood, the St. Anthony Catholic parish organizing committee [...]
CCO’s Covenant for Families, developed by the work of congregations across the metro, includes three concrete campaigns in which we will come together to reduce inequality, improve public health, and secure financial security for families. These priorities call for improvements to the systems we live in and the creation of new solutions to the everyday problems we face.
At this critical time of financial crisis and political gridlock, will you stand up for working families and call for policies and measures that will make this country a Land of Opportunity for all? Add your name and join the clergy leaders below who have already signed.
Join people of faith and communities leaders throughout Kansas City to CAP THE RATE on payday and other high cost loans. Learn how predatory lending affects our families and join the 36 for 36% movement here.
Check out the data, charts, and maps from October 18th Communities Creating Opportunity NOW Action at Union Station.
You have the power to improve neighborhoods throughout Greater Kansas City through CCO. Click here to learn more.
The Faith and Families Summit is a day in which faith and lay leaders from across Missouri convene in our capitol to seek solutions to issues hurting our families and impacting our congregations.
See how PICO changes lives, strengthens families and revitalizes communities across the country.
