Women Who Lead: Empowering Communities Through Investment
March is Women’s History Month! With this year’s theme highlighting women educating and inspiring generations, we’re featuring women-led organizations empowering future generations through community investment.
Local Return
Driven by Co-Founder and President Jessica David, Local Return has a vision for Rhode Island families and communities to control their own economic destiny. They’re working to make this vision a reality by taking a systems approach to community wealth building, as described by the Democracy Collaborative.
Local Return aims to build a local community investment ecosystem by: increasing community consciousness and capacity around local economies, community investment, and ownership; promoting local policies and practices that support a vibrant and just local economy; creating and using local assets to make Rhode Island communities more vibrant; and developing assets in such ways that the wealth stays local.
Learn more about Local Return’s mission and approach.
Advisors for Change
Advisors for Change focuses on people as the primary drivers of successful financial management systems. They help organizations strengthen their financial engagement and understanding to produce more transparent, accurate, timely, and useful information for management and external reporting purposes.
True to their people-centric mission, Advisors for Change recently converted to a worker-owned cooperative on January 1, 2025. Led by CEO Amy McPherson, the Advisors for Change team worked closely with PathLight Law’s Sarah Kaplan to adopt an employee-ownership model that aligns with their long-standing belief and practice in transparency, empowerment, and putting people first.
Learn more about their transition to a worker-owned cooperative.
Shared Capital Cooperative
A lending and investment firm for cooperatives of all sizes, Shared Capital Cooperative is flipping the script on who has power and who benefits in our economy. Their mission to build a just, equitable and democratic economy by investing in cooperative (co-op) enterprise is exemplified in their own organizational structure and foundation. Though Executive Director Christina Jennings heads Shared Capital, the co-op is democratically owned and governed by its members, with 300 cooperatives in 35 states and the District of Columbia.
With ownership held by employees, customers, the community, and other key stakeholders, co-ops have the ability to improve the lives of their members and their communities. Shared Capital Cooperative is doing their part to ensure co-ops connect with the capital they need to thrive.
Learn more about Shared Capital Cooperative’s impact.
Real People’s Fund
REAL People’s Fund (RPF) is a community-powered fund building collective wealth and democratic decision-making power to advance a restorative and inclusive economy in the East Bay. RPF provides non-extractive capital, holistic business advising, and power-building opportunities to support small businesses and entrepreneurs in shifting economic conditions and systems.
Governed by Bay Area organizers, entrepreneurs, innovators, and financial activists, RPF works across diverse social justice sectors to shape an economic future rooted in justice, equity, accessibility, and care. Powered by community, for community, RPF is reimagining capital and power to foster thriving, self-determined communities.