The Community Development Financial Institutions Fund today announced awards for fiscal years 2025 and 2026 along with a reminder that it will monitor recipients for compliance with federal anti-discrimination laws.
The CDFI Fund announced awards for the FY 2025 Community Development Financial Institutions and Native American CDFI Assistance Programs, and the FY 2026 Bank Enterprise Award and Small Dollar Loan Programs. Collectively, the awards will support a nationwide increase in safe and affordable financial services, small business and consumer lending, and community development investments, the CDFI Fund said.
The allocation of 2025 funds comes only two weeks before they were set to expire, with the delay prompting at least one lawsuit seeking to release the funds. The Trump administration has accused past administrations of using the CDFI Fund to pursue a “woke” policy agenda. As a result, the Treasury Department plans to step up monitoring of award recipients, which the CDFI Fund reiterated in its announcement.
“Treasury continues to closely review these awards throughout their periods of performance — including through audits, compliance reviews, and other monitoring of awardee performance and expenditures — to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse in its programs and to ensure that awardees do not engage in practices that violate federal anti-discrimination laws,” the CDFI Fund said.
