News

Ohio Capital Finance Corporation, in partnership with CareSource, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Partners For Kids, is pleased to announce a $4 million effort to build and rehabilitate affordable, high-quality rental housing in Columbus. Healthy Homes, the affordable housing arm of Nationwide Children’s Healthy Neighborhoods Healthy Families initiative is serving as the developer of this effort. OCFC assisted in structuring these investments to create a capital stack comprised solely of funding from nonprofit organizations with a 10-year term. The rental housing units will sit on lots that were provided by the City of Columbus Land Bank. Upon completion, the 20 units will serve households at or below 80% of AMI.

CareSource OCFC Partnership Addresses the Digital Divide in Appalachia

In the first half of 2020, the pandemic magnified the issues presented by digital divide. The number of households without access to stable internet is staggering and to be estimated at over 162 million Americans. In response to this growing issue, OCFC, with funding support from CareSource, a Dayton Ohio-based multistate nonprofit managed care plan, created the $5 million investment fund, the CareSource Fund for Appalachia.

Through this fund, OCFC will leverage resources to assist LMI residents with access to the internet with goals of improving health and education outcomes. By providing low cost (1.5%) bridge financing, the fund will generate additional equity and cost savings to support real estate improvements. In turn, this will advance residents’ access to digital resources, including the installation of building-wide internet service, individual unit Wi-Fi hotspots, dedicated space for tele-health services and other supportive opportunities. 

To learn more about this innovative funding source, please contact Aaron Murphy (amurphy@occh.org) or Jon Welty (jwelty@occh.org).