When Banking Meets Community: PNC's Community Leadership Symposium Confronts America's Affordability Crisis

At PNC’s headquarters in Pittsburgh, the atmosphere in the corporate auditorium felt different. It was less about quarterly reports and more about ground-level impact. As community development financial institutions (CDFIs) and nonprofit leaders convened for the bank's fourth and final annual Community Leadership Symposium, the conversations that unfolded revealed both remarkable progress and weighty concerns facing American communities.  Rey Ocañas, managing director, PNC Community Development Banking, set the tone immediately, acknowledging: "We're all going through a lot. There's a lot happening in the country." 

The day together offered an honest examination of how financial institutions and community organizations can work together to address poverty, lack of capital access, and the economic pressures squeezing American families. PNC created what they called a "learning space"—a concentrated day of actionable insights, meaningful discussions, and genuine networking opportunities shared together in one room.

The day's agenda reflected this intentional design. Attendees heard from Sarah Rosen Wartell, CEO of the Urban Institute, Richard Bynum, PNC's Chief Corporate Responsibility Officer (CCRO), and Bill Demchak, PNC Chairman and CEO engaged in dialogue about solutions and multiple community leaders working with the bank to address community needs.

Taking Financial Education Seriously—and Teaching with Humor

Michelle Singletary—award-winning personal finance columnist for The Washington Post and author of "The 21-Day Financial Fast"—brought both humor and hard truths to the gathering. Her approach immediately resonated with the audience, beginning with an acknowledgment that personal finance has become "rocket science" for many Americans, filled with 401(k)s, IRAs, Roths, bonds, and securities that leave people overwhelmed.

Singletary painted a vivid picture of the current economic landscape. She shared sobering statistics: nearly 20% of new car buyers now have monthly payments exceeding $1,000. Working-class Americans face not just stagnant wages but rising costs for housing, electricity, and groceries. Even more troubling, 48% of households earning over $100,000 annually report living paycheck to paycheck—a sign that financial stress has crept far beyond low-income communities.

The rise in cybercrime added another layer of concern, with the FBI reporting $16.6 billion in losses—and that's just what's been reported. 

Singletary reminded the room full of financial professionals and community leaders that behind every statistic is a human story, behind every financial struggle is a person trying to make sense of an increasingly complex system.

The Affordability Crisis Takes Center Stage

Sarah Rosen Wartell, president of the Urban Institute, crystallized what many in the room already knew from their daily work: America faces an affordability crisis that threatens our social cohesion. Her presentation offered a stark statistic—only 25% of Americans believe they have a good chance of improving their standard of living, the lowest response in the 38 years that question has been asked.

As Wartell explained, when people cannot afford the future they envision for themselves and their children, it undermines the very foundation of the American dream. The median age of first-time homeownership has shifted to a decade later than it was in the 1980s, and young adults increasingly doubt they'll ever own homes or be able to retire. These aren't abstract concerns—they represent a fundamental shift in how Americans view their economic futures.

The Urban Institute's forthcoming American Affordability Tracker, which Wartell announced would launch later in the year, aims to provide granular data down to the congressional district level. This tool represents more than just data collection; it's an acknowledgment that solving the affordability crisis requires understanding its local manifestations. After all, the housing crisis in Los Angeles looks very different from the one in Columbus, Ohio, even though both cities face severe challenges.

Beyond the Numbers: PNC's Community Benefits in Action

PNC CCRO Richard K. Bynum brought the discussion from the theoretical to the tangible. Over three and a half years, PNC has deployed $103 billion through its Community Benefits Plan—a figure that, as Bynum noted was equivalent to the entire size of PNC Bank when he joined it twenty years prior.

Bynum noted that big numbers alone don't tell the story. The real impact lies in individual transformations. He shared the story of a Baltimore woman who started with $4,500 in savings, was told she'd never own a home, but through PNC's assistance with down payment programs, purchased property. Three years later, her net worth had grown to over $100,000. This story, Bynum noted, had been repeated 64,000 times through the program—64,000 families building generational wealth through homeownership.

The plan’s $17.1 billion in small business lending revealed important lessons about the nature of small business needs. As Bynum explained, most small businesses need modest bridge financing—money to cover the gap between delivering services and getting paid. This realization led the company to restructure its approach, creating specialized community business banking officers who were positioned to nurture, anticipate and support small business needs and focus specifically on low-to-moderate income communities.

Ground Truth from the Front Lines

Tony Smith, PNC Community Development Banking Territory Executive led the next session. The panelists—representing organizations in Los Angeles, New York City, and Columbus—painted a picture of communities under unprecedented pressure.

Thomas Yu, executive director of Asian Americans for Equality in New York traced his organization's 52-year journey from street activism to becoming stewards of affordable housing. His organization now manages 50 buildings and has discovered they're not just housing providers but curators of neighborhood character. When small landlords sell to large equity firms, entire neighborhoods lose their identity—the tailor, the grocer, the restaurant that gave the area its soul all disappear.

In Columbus, J. Averi Frost, CEO of Freedom Equity, described the emergence of what they call "desperation enterprises"—businesses started by people who've been laid off and need income immediately. Frost’s three-year-old CDFI, certified specifically to serve Black businesses, faces the challenge of helping entrepreneurs in crisis while being undercapitalized itself. The organization has gotten creative, offering debt consolidation to bring predatory 35% interest loans down to 5%, and developing programs to help small business owners invest in real estate.

Rudy Espinosa from Inclusive Action for the City in Los Angeles addressed what he called the "9,000-pound elephant in the room." His voice carried both passion and pain as he told the story of a couple who had liquidated their restaurant to pay for their undocumented daughter's college education, then rebuilt their business through street vending, eventually becoming building owners.

His point was sharp and clear: the foundation of economic development work rests on stable, functioning communities. When that foundation is threatened, everything relying on its stability is threatened. The impact extends beyond individual families. Street vendors and small businesses in Los Angeles report dramatic drops in customer traffic as fear keeps people home, Espinosa noted. This ripple effect threatens not just individual businesses but entire local economies built on small-enterprise and community commerce.

New Models and New Contexts—Change is the only Constant

PNC Bank SVP and Community Development Banking Territory Executive Yoly Davila led a conversation with Tammy Thompson, CEO of Catapult Pittsburgh, Michelle Witthaus, Policy Design and Activation Lead for Invest STL in St. Louis, and Luis Granados, CEO of Mission Economic Development Agency in San Francisco that highlighted the need for new models and wrap-around services.  Working in three different regions with distinct needs, all emphasized the need for continued support and investment.  Invest STL got a $1 million grant to offer focused financial support to help individuals and families in gentrifying neighborhoods accumulate assets, secure stable housing, and resist being pushed out of their neighborhoods. This approach not only addresses immediate displacement issues but also promotes long-term, equitable growth by working to ensure all community members have a fair chance to benefit from local development and prosperity.  Each household selected had to agree to go through a financial education curriculum and then got $2000 for immediate needs such as debt or back taxes and $20,000 to support home purchases, repairs, business investments, and other wealth-building activities. Most participated in many more financial education modules than were required. The playbook is available here. 

Luis Granados talked about the long history of Mission Economic Development and the unprecedented pressure and trauma being experienced by the LatinX community, noting that the organization had to have a hard discussion this year about whether to continue their tax preparation assistance programs. Organizations serving this community face complex challenges. Having built volunteer income tax assistance programs specifically to help low-income Latino families comply with tax law. Now these same trusted spaces may feel dangerous to clients. Several panelists across the day noted seeing a noticeable change in community vitality—fewer shoppers in busy corridors, decreased numbers of students at schools.  

A recurring theme involved the rise of predatory lending, particularly merchant cash advances that can carry interest rates exceeding 35%. Tammy Thompson pointed out that CDFIs find themselves constantly playing catch-up, trying to refinance these toxic loans with more reasonable terms. The speed of predatory lenders—often providing cash within days through technology platforms—contrasts sharply with traditional CDFI processes that can take weeks.

The solution, panelists agreed, requires both technological advancement and policy change. CDFIs need systems that allow for rapid decision-making and deployment of capital, but they also need funding to make this possible. As one panelist bluntly stated: "We need more money” -making the point that CDFIs are undercapitalized assets that can strengthen communities in multiple ways.

Finding Solutions in a Complex Landscape

Despite the challenges, the symposium revealed numerous innovative approaches emerging from necessity. The Urban Institute's Wartell outlined three key strategies for addressing affordability: increasing supply of scarce goods like housing, publicly subsidizing essentials that provide community benefits such as day care and helping families increase their incomes.

Some solutions require rethinking fundamental assumptions. Several panelists discussed the challenge of business succession planning, particularly in immigrant communities where children who've been sent to college often don't want to take over family businesses. This "great transfer," as McKinsey calls it, represents trillions in potential wealth that could evaporate if these businesses simply close rather than transfer to new owners.

Employee ownership models emerged as one potential solution, though panelists acknowledged these require significant investment in capacity building and aren't suitable for every situation. The conversation revealed a gap in the ecosystem—few firms specialize in valuing small businesses for sale, making it difficult for owners to realize their businesses' worth or for potential buyers to secure appropriate financing.

Perhaps the most powerful moment came when Yu reframed the economic development conversation. "We are nation building," he declared. "From the street vendor to the homeowner entrepreneur, that is the fabric of this country." Yu reminded the room that what might be dismissed as "grassroots work" or labeled narrowly as "diversity and inclusion" initiatives represents something far more fundamental—the building blocks of American democracy and economy.

This perspective transforms how we understand community development work. It's not charity or corporate responsibility in isolation—it's the essential work of maintaining and strengthening the social and economic fabric that holds communities together. When that fabric tears, as it did after 9/11 in New York or during the pandemic everywhere, these organizations and partnerships become the weavers who repair it.

Looking Forward: The Work Continues

As the symposium concluded, the path forward seemed both clearer and more challenging. PNC's commitment to continue and expand its community benefits work provides one model for how large financial institutions can remain connected to community needs. PNC's focus on growth opportunities—and more importantly, its willingness to learn and adjust—suggests an evolution in how corporate America approaches community investment.

But the broader challenges—affordability, political uncertainty, climate change, technological disruption—require more than any single institution can provide. They demand what the symposium itself represented: sustained collaboration between banks, CDFIs, nonprofits, government agencies, and communities themselves.

The final message seemed to be that in an era of mounting challenges, the relationships built through gatherings like this symposium become even more critical. As communities face obstacles both old and new, from gentrification to immigration, from predatory lending to climate disasters, the networks of support and expertise cultivated through these partnerships may be the difference between communities that merely survive and those that thrive.