CBA Equity Declaration

Contextual statement

At CBA, we recognize the legacy of systemic racism and cultural oppression that have long served as barriers to success for communities of color and those who have been historically disenfranchised. We believe that our organization is stronger when we embrace and celebrate the diverse experiences of our employees, board, and larger credit building community and work to be a proactively anti-racist organization. Our employees, board, and membership represent a range of races and ethnicities, genders and gender identities, sexual orientations, abilities, generations, spiritual beliefs, socioeconomic backgrounds, communication styles and more. This diversity brings valuable perspectives to our work and our relationships. It inspires us to advocate for one another and seek solutions that benefit us all.

In addition, we recognize that consumers of color and immigrants have been historically excluded from access to regulated, safe credit building opportunities. A predatory alternative financial service industry stepped in to profit off of communities of color and immigrants with no other options. Continued (intentional and unintentional) discrimination against, divestment, and extraction from communities of color contributes to credit invisibility and low credit scores. Given these complex realities and the stark racial wealth gap that persists, the unique role that CBA plays in the credit building field, and our national platform, we make the following commitments to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Justice (DEIJ) as we implement our Mission and Values.

Inside CBA

Supporting All CBA Staff Members

We encourage ideas, suggestions, and correction to improve and implement CBA’s commitment to DEIJ. We match the energy and courage that it takes to provide constructive criticism and education with a commitment to action.

We commit to valuing all staff equally and listening to feedback from all team members, regardless of position, and genuinely vetting and discussing the change or proposal. We commit to providing a variety of channels for receiving feedback in a way that acknowledges power dynamics.

We commit to providing equitable professional development and internal advancement opportunities to our staff by:

conducting compensation surveys every 2-3 years (salary distribution, industry matching, pay transparency),

ensuring that advancement opportunities are offered in an equitable fashion,

supporting professional growth opportunities,

implementing measures that ensure we are aware of any inequities and address them proactively

We commit to putting in the time to work toward dismantling existing systemic racism within our internal structure and culture.

We will ensure pay equity for BIPOC, women, and other staff who have faced historic pay disparities.

We commit to devoting proportionally greater resources than in the past to provide ongoing training for our staff and board, to increase our understanding of racism, oppression, and privilege at the individual, interpersonal, organizational, community and systemic level. We utilize both internal and external expertise, centering the voice and perspective of BIPOC and other marginalized people.

Internal Culture

We begin from a recognition that we are all learning and will all make mistakes, but we are united in our commitment to perpetual improvement.

We pledge to never intentionally seek to do harm, and despite best intention, we will acknowledge when we have done harm by openly receiving, reflecting on, and learning from productive feedback offered by colleagues, consultants, partners, and clients. Rather than denial or justification, we are willing to learn and grow from mistakes.

We as an organization will actively take up the work to ensure that it maintains and embodies a genuine DEIJ framework and does not expect staff members, especially BIPOC staff, to carry this work entirely for the organization for it is the organization’s (Executive Team, Board, allies) responsibility to do so.

We commit time and funding annually, as highlighted in the budget, to support each other to further ourselves and our work as an anti-racist organization.

We hold each other accountable to CBA’s DEIJ goals by listening to understand, recognizing that each individual’s journey may be different from our own, and by committing to transparency and grace.

We commit to setting, tracking, and reviewing DEIJ goals at the organizational, team and individual levels.

Internal Diversity

We strive to purposefully recruit, hire, retain, promote, and support BIPOC and other historically underrepresented staff across all levels of the organization. This includes increasing the diversity of CBA’s staff, Executive leadership and Board so that we can embody the diversity of CBA’s membership.

We foster a culture where all can express ourselves fully, contribute in meaningful ways and advance professionally. In our workplace, each of us is valued, accepted, and empowered to do our best. Our differences make us stronger and our respect for each other gives us power.

Mission/Guiding principles

We commit to centering the lived experiences of our staff, our members, and their communities in the design of our programs, organizational development, and fulfillment of our mission.

We commit to investing time, resources, and funding to address the ways systemic, cultural and interpersonal forms of racism and oppression appears in our workplace, programs and industry.

We commit to creating equity and opportunity, internally and externally, through our policies, processes, and people, and through the programming that we offer.

Accountability

We commit to developing and implementing mechanisms of accountability to CBA’s equity framework and to evaluate our commitment and how it shows up in our actions.

We commit to reviewing, assessing, and re-evaluating our commitment to racial equity work every six months.

Outside CBA

Impact of systemic racism on our work

Through our programs and services, we uncover and seek to disrupt systemic issues in the credit industry that have resulted in economic injustice and exclusion for communities of color.

We commit to learning from our members on how we can be responsive to their needs, and hence the needs of their communities.

Partners

We prioritize providing support and resources to communities/organizations that are BIPOC-led.

We commit to activities and partnerships that amplify the voices of BIPOC advocates and practitioners in the spirit of economic justice and true allyship.

We seek to partner with BIPOC-led organizations on grant funding and will compensate partner organizations fairly for the outcomes we expect.