On September 27, 2023, M&T Bank announced that it had awarded $1.22 million this year to 42 Pennsylvania community revitalization initiatives aimed at serving distressed communities or low-income neighborhoods through the state’s Neighborhood Assistance Program (NAP).
The NAP program provides tax credits to businesses like M&T that donate capital to support projects approved to receive NAP funding for affordable housing, community services, crime prevention, education, job training, food access, blight, special population issues, veterans’ initiatives or long-term community revitalization.
“Supporting the communities we serve is at our core, and M&T stands firmly behind the Neighborhood Assistance Program – a catalyst for igniting dynamic revitalization efforts throughout the state,” said Gail D’Angelo, M&T’s Regional Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) Manager.
“As our neighborhoods evolve, we’re thrilled to join this year’s cohort of partner organizations granted NAP approval to support the profound changes they will bring across Pennsylvania,” she added.
M&T provided funding for many initiatives across its Pennsylvania footprint including in the southeast, Philadelphia and central areas with contributions totaling $290,000, $300,000 and $230,000 respectively, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2023.
The projects M&T helped support through the NAP include:
- $50,000 for The Working to Empower People for Advancement (WEPA) to establish a bilingual community-based workforce development center in the city of Lebanon;
- $50,000 for Diamond City Partnership, an economic development alliance working to transform downtown Wilkes-Barre;
- $30,000 for Affordable Housing Centers of Pennsylvania to provide housing counseling services to residents of West Philadelphia, where mortgage foreclosures are up and homeownership among Black residents is down;
- $25,000 to HDC Mid-Atlantic for the ongoing development of its College Avenue affordable housing project in Lancaster;
- $25,000 to Kutztown University Small Business Development Center to assist entrepreneurs and small-business owners in Kutztown gain access to the resources and information they need to launch or grow their businesses; and,
- $10,000 for Midwest Food Bank to provide food rescue and distribution to more than 137,000 hungry individuals in Central Pennsylvania.
M&T Bank has participated in the NAP program for more than 20 years, with increased contributions in each of the past three years.
In the fiscal year ending June 30, 2023, the bank provided $1.22 million to 42 projects throughout the state, which represents a more than 45% increase over the previous fiscal year.
Photo of the Reading Railroad Station at North 8th Street, Lebanon, Pennsylvania is by Smallbones via Wikipedia.