Neighborhood Economic Development and Advocacy Project
Sarah Ludwig, Founder and Executive DIrector
The Neighborhood Economic Development Advocacy Project, (NEDAP), is a resource and advocacy center established in 1995. Through coalition building, grassroots organizing support, and issues-based advocacy, NEDAP promotes financial justice in low income communities and communities of color in New York City. As an information clearinghouse, NEDAP helps translate complex financial issues into information that groups use to advocate for fair access to credit and financial services, NEDAP helps groups draw connections between neighborhood economic conditions and the broader system of financial services and capital distribution in the United States. Working with NEDAP, groups have secured bank branches for their neighborhoods, challenged bank mega-mergers, and educated their membership about community economic rights.
NEDAP runs several programs. The Economic Justice Center helps local groups press for access to sound credit and community-controlled economic development. The Financial Justice Mapping Project generates naps that organizations use to educate their membership and press for policy reform and corporate accountability. The Fair Lending Project trains groups on discriminatory and abusive mortgage lending and the destabilizing impact on communities. An annual Workshop Series provides training on pressing topics such as insurance relining, the two-tiered banking system and community reinvestment advocacy tools. A Community Financial Literacy and Justice Curriculum teaches individual financial literacy in the context of boarder economic justice.
NEDAP also founded and coordinates New Yorkers for Responsible Lending, a statewide coalition of 95 groups dedicated to fighting predatory lending. NEDAP’s efforts were instrumental in passage of a major state law that prohibits high cost mortgage lenders from gouging borrowers.