Dreams for Change
What they do & why we invested
Dreams for Change serves the needs of families and individuals experiencing homelessness and other low-income individuals. The organization delivers social assistance and wraparound services modeled around three pathways to stability: support to remove barriers, employment, and income stabilization. Efforts include the Safe Parking Program for those who sleep in their cars, Dreams’ Cuisine social enterprise workforce training program, free tax preparation, and financial education. Due to COVID-19, Dreams for Change has seen a delay in contract reimbursement, a decrease in funding for their services, and a significant loss of fee-for-service revenues. Capital will be used as a cash flow to cover operational costs to maintain services and start new programs in response to COVID-19, such as food distribution and growing their social enterprise to provide more workforce opportunities.
Updates
08/2022—Dreams for Change successfully repaid their loan. CEO & Founder Dr. Teresa Smith said, “Our loan from Mission Driven Finance provided bridge funding for us to continue our food distribution work and other projects during state budget cuts. Because this was our first loan as an organization, the Mission Driven Finance team was very helpful in answering questions from our board. The process was easy and straightforward.”
Impact Segment
COVID-19 economic recovery
Impact Vehicles
San Diego County COVID-19 Small Business & Nonprofit Loan Program (nonprofit loan pool)
Dates of Investments
October 2020
Impact Geography
San Diego County
Status
Successfully repaid
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