Neighborhood Economics: Cultivating Black Entrepreneurship and the Legacy of Black Wall Streets

Ever wondered how capitalism can evolve into a force for social good? Our latest episode features Lynier Richardson, a distinguished academic and entrepreneur with deep roots in community development and economic empowerment. Together, we dissect the complex tapestry of social enterprises, revealing how profitability and social impact aren't mutually exclusive but rather complementary facets of modern business. Lynier brings his wealth of knowledge from Rutgers Business School to the table, painting a picture of an economy where undervalued assets in marginalized communities are recognized and harnessed, inspiring a new generation of ethical investors and entrepreneurs.

The conversation takes a turn as we scrutinize the traditional measures of business success, suggesting a paradigm shift where long-term gains for both community and environment are paramount. Lynier and I share our reservations about practices like payday lending and discuss the need to balance respect for capital with accountability for its broader implications. It's a discourse that bridges the gap between the academic and the practical, examining the ethical nuances that must be navigated to foster inclusive economic growth.

Wrapping up our exploration, we celebrate the resilience and innovation of black entrepreneurship, focusing on the historical significance and potential revitalization of Black Wall Streets. We reflect on the transformative power of local economies and the role of conferences like the Neighborhood Economic Development Conference in connecting capital to community projects. As a professor, I share my encouragement for students to apply their business skills to societal challenges, making this episode not just a conversation, but a call to action for listeners to rethink success and engage in impactful economic practices.

https://www.business.rutgers.edu/faculty/lyneir-richardson

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Transcript

Joel: 0:33

What if investing in each other could change the world? I'm Joel Skeen with bizradious and this is the Mindful Marketplace. Well, thanks so much for being on the Mindful Marketplace here with me today. Linear Richardson I have on. He is a really impressive guy and I am really excited to get to dig in with him on his perspective as part of the series that we're doing for Neighborhood Economics here on bizradious. So, man, Linear, welcome.

Lynier: 1:06

Glad to. It's my pleasure. Yeah, it's my pleasure to be with you. I'm looking forward to our conversation today.

Joel: 1:12

Yeah, I am too, because you strike me as very interesting because not only are you teaching at Rutgers and the executive director there of the Center for Urban Entrepreneurship and Economic Development, so you also went to law school. You've got a lot of like academic cred, you also kind of have a lot of, you know, kind of non-profit economic development cred as well in your CV here. But then also you've been a business owner and an entrepreneur as well. Is that right?

Lynier: 1:47

I have. I'm at a high point in my career right now because I get to teach entrepreneurship and advocate for entrepreneurs. Sometimes I like to call it, you know, being a lamp. I get to shine the light on entrepreneurs standing in the corner and, you know, try to illuminate good things that are happening. And then, you know, for another part of my week, I get to be entrepreneurial and actually go and do projects, to structure deals, to invest in companies and enterprises, and all with the aim of, you know, doing capitalism a little differently and making neighborhoods better. And, specifically, my work has been focused on communities of color and getting closing the racial wealth gap, getting resources and creating opportunities, you know, for people that have been overlooked and undervalued.

Joel: 2:45

Yeah, undervalued, I think is a really common theme in what it seems like you, because that's important to know and to be able to identify in business and in, I think, the work that you're doing in community development. How do you see those things interplaying when it comes to undervalued assets or undervalued communities?

Lynier: 3:09

Yeah, you know, when I teach a class at Rutgers Business School called Urban Entrepreneurship and Economic Development, and the central thesis of the class is to help people to see opportunity and to create business strategy and to determine how to arrange the capital financial capital, community capital, social capital and other types of capital to be able to operate profitably and sustainably.

Lynier: 3:46

You know enterprises and projects in communities, and so that's the nature of my focus. It's like how do I you know we want to, as Michael Porter has this article in a YouTube video that I really like, I share it often, and it's really focused on how to create business solutions to social problems, and that the core of the message is that when a solution is scalable and can be done profitably, it can be scaled, and you know, and if it can be scaled, it can be, you know, much more impactful, right? So instead of just a nonprofit lens, even if there's a social mission, my focus has been how do you structure the transaction so that it can be profitable, so that it can be sustainable and that it ultimately can be a solution that is scalable?

Joel: 4:51

Yeah, it reminds me a little bit. We've had on a lot. One of the focuses of our show has been, you know, we kind of hit the solidarity economy in general and one of those pieces is social enterprise.

Joel: 5:03

And that's kind of why I wanted to like dig in with you on that dichotomy of, you know, kind of nonprofit work and business work and the blurry lines there and where they don't need to be lines, and all of that kind of stuff, because I started as a, you know I did the Peace Corps and then I was a social worker for chronically homeless folks in the Detroit area ran a food bank, did some other food insecurity work around there, and but then I got a position as a social enterprise manager for a urban farming healthy food access nonprofit where we were selling garden products and services, so that we could then use the profits from those sales to fund the work we were doing where we were giving low income families raised beds and we were, you know, holding classes to teach people how to grow their own food and kind of take control of their own food security, but for a lot of people I feel like that's you know those are two kind of separate worlds.

Joel: 5:58

There's an idea that we should only make as much as possible in our business and that really kind of that one bottom line sort of has to be the only bottom line, and then you know, if we're successful maybe we'll give 10% of that back to a charity or something along those lines. But it seems like a lot of your work is on kind of questioning that assumption that those have to be two different pockets.

Lynier: 6:22

Yeah, joe, I'm gonna lament with you and say, man, I feel sorry for you, here's why you got the same bug that I have, right? Yeah, some mornings I wake up and I wish that you know the Lord had made my mission clear. Some people want to be very clear, want to be a billionaire. They want to own the world. They want to invest in companies. They want to, you know, make up, you know, a billion dollars. And there's some people that want to be missionaries. They want to save the world and work in nonprofits.

Lynier: 6:57

I met some recently, had an opportunity some to meet sisters, nuns, who you know are really at their heart about you know, they've dedicated their lives to other people. Well, you and I and others and folks in neighborhood economics, we're in the middle. Right, where I never wanted to be a billionaire, but I never wanted to be. I never wanted to take the vow of poverty either. Right. And so the question would be is for me, as always, could I do good, could I have impact? Could I solve problems in the toughest places? Could I get resources to people who say, well, it's too hard, and, at the same time, could I be profitable? Right For me, I've been an entrepreneur long enough that I can tell you without equivocation that operating a business and not making a profit at some point is not fun, even if you deal with passion, great passion, yeah, with great passion, you know, with people cheering for you, that you know, when you're struggling to meet payroll or, you know, have cash management, cash flow problem, that's when business is not fun, right?

Lynier: 8:13

So, on the other hand, when you get an affirmation for someone that says, you know, I've never had an opportunity until the work that you're doing or the project that you created, you know, gave me a new approach, right, gave me a new opportunity, gave me the capital I needed, that has its reward to me. That is worth as much as you know. You know as much as cash, right. So that dilemma of how do you have impact and I'm sure it's personal for each person, right. So I'm not, I'm not extolling myself. Or you know, there are people who make money and do give 10% away, right? I have a friend that calls that throwing coats at the problem. I want to make money and then I'm gonna donate and there's no. You know, I don't denigrate or judge anybody for that oh no oh no.

Lynier: 9:12

On the other hand, this and again I say I lament about it because it's much harder. It's much harder to run a social enterprise. It's much harder to raise capital when you're trying to have impact and people are like, yeah, impact, yeah, that's great, but can you get me a 15% IRR, right? And so you know there's a certain group of impact first investors as opposed to finance investors. But for every impact first investor, there's probably, you know, a hundred finance first investors, right. So the work is hard in a different way, but it's rewarding in a in a different way to that. You know these my soul.

Joel: 9:55

Yeah, it reminds me of what Michael Schumann, who I got to have on, said you know, there's financial capital, but then there's also social capital, you know, and and I think that that's really where it's at is maybe is it, is it just that our ideas of what a return on investment is, or what improvement, or what you know kind of these ideas that we have about productivity, is it just that those ideas are too?

Lynier: 10:20

narrow, narrow. Yeah, I, I certainly believe so. You know we are. We have a little in. We're raising a little investment fund. We started, we launched it and our investors are what I call philanthropically motivated impact investors. Here's what that means, you know. They're investing between two and five million dollars in our fund. We have a a concessionary return, a five percent preferred return and an eight percent target return.

Lynier: 10:58

If you're raising capital in the traditional, you know, non-impact space, those returns are considered low. But the case that I often make is, yes, you get a five percent return, but here are the basket of benefits. The other, you know returns crime is lower. More people graduate from school. There's more siege. You know. Community engagement and civic involvement right that you know there's inspiration. Hopefully there's some impacts on social determinants of health. People live longer or healthier, right.

Lynier: 11:39

And how do you calculate that? So you get a five percent return, financial return, but you got if one less person goes to prison. One less person is, you know you'll find a way to be economically productive. Or you know, one less murder happens. Hey, one kid sees professionals that look like them working on a project, owning a project, or architects or lawyers, and gets inspired. That's got to be worth a five percent additional return or twelve percent return, right.

Lynier: 12:15

And so that thought of finding someone that says I have count, I've raised my money, my money, traditional way in American capitalism system either entrepreneurship, I succeeded in corporate or inherited a lot of dollars right, my approach is your two million dollar investment in my enterprise. There's no reason why you must demand a twenty percent IRR if I can get you your money back and get you a return on capital and and solve the problems that make your neighborhoods better, that improve the quality of life in the city and the places that you call home. There should be a compelling investment proposition. And so that's what's different, right, because you still have. I still see even young professionals who come out of traditional banking and they'll come in the social enterprise, they'll come into a CDFI, they'll come into some big philanthropy and they still will have been so ingrained and, as I said, we're trying to do capitalism a little differently that's so ingrained with.

Lynier: 13:20

Oh well, we can do this work in the in the toughest part of neighborhood, and then some people have and can get a market return, right, I believe, to drive inclusive economic development to strengthen the toughest parts of the city, you got to find favorable capital right and so that favorable investment capital, and so every day we're thinking about how do you make the case right? That's what the neighborhood economics conferences, you know, sort of giving us an opportunity to do is to really talk about capital in a way that doesn't disrespect it, you know, that values it, that places a priority on return of capital and even return on investment, but also level sets that expectation so that the social impacts also are deemed merit worthy and a part of the definition of success yeah, it's like you have to you know, and that's why I kind of I like that language of language kind of the triple bottom line, and I think there can be more than three bottom lines honestly.

Joel: 14:33

But you know, thinking that it's not, there are other bottom lines that we have to think about, aside just from what's the maximum return on investment that I could get and think well you know if I got the maximum return on investment, but in the process I kind of cut my legs out for me in the future by destroying the environment that we live in or by, you know, hurting the community that I live in, which then creates more risk for me in the in the long run.

Joel: 14:59

You know, some of it seems like like it needs to, like our thinking around investment needs to broaden, but some of it seems like it just needs to extend further into the future.

Lynier: 15:09

I'm curious your thoughts on that. Yeah, I, I agree 100%. You know, I cannot imagine intentionally engaging in a business practice that is extracted wonder what that? I've wondered what that feels like on the other side. I wonder what the thought process is.

Lynier: 15:33

And someone will say, hey, you know you need the capital, I know you need it. So you know, either take it at, you know some, you know zorius type of interest rate or you know, I look at, you know payday lending and you know check cashing and you know weekly furniture rental. And I still often ask myself well, clearly there's a market right, people need it and they must be serving them. So I can imagine, I imagine being in those board rooms or, you know, in the business strategy meetings and saying all right, we're going to offer these TVs that you know cost $500 and we're going to rent them out at $50 a week. And I'm assuming the business proposition would say we're making you know TV access, you know, affordable for people who wouldn't right. But man, you know the $50 week TV that is, you know, cost $500 and that's rented for a year.

Lynier: 16:41

The person, you know the company has, you know it's a phenomenal, you know probably financial return, but it really is continuing to perpetuate. You know the financial insecurity and the poverty level of the individuals who must do that. So it's hard to you know. So that again, it's strategy, right? Someone says here's what I'm doing, here's the problem. People don't have the ability to make a big credit purchase and we're going to provide an option. But I often wonder at what point does it become business strategy versus? You know, positive impact, right, and so that again. So I don't knock it. I just know what's fun for me is to have business purpose and social impact sure is really rewarding to me.

Joel: 17:33

Well, that was a big thing that I remember. I've been kind of learning and you know I've read a lot of books this year and I. One of them was Marjorie Kelly's Wealth Supremacy. I just got to interview her yesterday actually.

Lynier: 17:44

Oh wow, it was really great.

Joel: 17:45

Yes, and she talked about that idea in the book of there are ways to make money that are kind of productive and then there are ways to make money that are extractive. She talked a lot about the extractive ways and what she calls like the financialization of our economy, especially in this neoliberal era that we live in and it sounds to me like that's a part of what you're saying.

Joel: 18:05

Maybe I'm off, but a part of it is that, okay, there are two ways to generate capital. There are two ways to make a profit. In broad strokes, you can either make a profit by creating something, by producing something a good or a service and then getting paid for the value that you add by adding that good to that service.

Joel: 18:25

Or you can figure out ways to kind of slice money out of the pie for yourself without really putting anything into it, which is known as rent seeking or what you said with, like, if you just have a TV and you start renting out that TV. And it is striking to me because more and more it does seem like we're moving away from when you buy a movie. Now you don't actually buy that movie, you kind of pay for the right to license it Everything's on a subscription.

Joel: 18:53

Now we don't actually own anything. Even work has become with the gig economy has become more and more where things kind of seems like we're having to turn our cars and our homes with Airbnb or anything into a profit making. It's like the profit making animal that needs to kind of keep eating, sometimes feels like it's creeping more and more and more into your home and into your life and into your space. I don't know if I got a question wrapped up in there, but that's what you're making me think of and I'm with you, I'm 100% with you.

Lynier: 19:25

That and with this, with this little nuance, you know I mentioned I teach this class at Rutgers Business School and a question that has been on my quiz every year for 10 years is there's the bottom line, the double bottom line and triple bottom line. Give me a bullet point on what each means and according to Professor Richardson, this is my way of making sure they listen to class which is the most important and the most important I still believe, is the bottom line, the profit, the first line. You know you got it again.

Lynier: 20:03

You got to be profitable to stay sustainable to stay in the game, to be able to have impact Right. And so I'm just thinking in my work it's well, can we do capitalism just a little differently? We still got to be profitable, but is there an insistence on being a, you know, profit maximization? Or is there a way to invite people who typically have not had an opportunity to also invest on the same terms that we do and benefit financially from the success of you know, the project or the business proposition that we're operating? So we now own, as you may know, we own five shopping centers.

Lynier: 20:49

We're about to run the contract to acquire our six, and the nature of the work is we identify a property, we do the due diligence, we do the financial underwriting, we ultimately decide, hey, to buy this property.

Lynier: 21:06

We own shopping centers, the community shopping centers. To buy this community shopping center is going to require a million dollars of equity and we have decided that, you know, we're willing to invest with our fund and with our own capital up to 95% of that equity, but we're also willing to accept as low as 49% of that, as low as 51% of that equity, so to make 49% available to community investors, to small individuals. And so we now have a few projects. We have 330 plus small black local investors in our projects, right, and we're really excited about that because you know what that means is these individuals we expect will patronize, will protect, will respect the shopping center, will have the pride of ownership, even if it's $1,000 that we own, that we have an ownership stake and we've never had an opportunity to have an investment, you know, or to own something.

Lynier: 22:12

I had a lady tell me once, you know, I've lived in this community for 43 years. I called it my own, but I've never actually owned anything until I invested in the shopping center project. Right, so that work of you know, democratizing ownership and sharing of profit. They're taking a risk to steal a real estate project. If it doesn't work, they could lose their thousand, all or part of their thousand dollars. But we're, you know, and we can lose all our part of the $800,000 we've invested.

Lynier: 22:44

Okay, but the goal is more people, understanding business, understanding how an asset that they drive by and they, you know, shop in their neighborhood, how these individuals now can be connected to the ownership you know, can be empowered to make decisions, can, you know, have voice in the process.

Joel: 23:13

Right.

Lynier: 23:14

And hopefully that will stimulate a other investment activity, as I said, civic engagement, inspiration to the youth. So we're even the 330 people we don't brand as just. We branded as we own this and a. We is not just those 330 people, it's I went to college with them, that's my uncle or my grandson or my you know cousin, my problem date. You know we have a connection to somebody that owns something in our communities and that that's the innovation is still very rare. You know we're early in the process. Obviously you know very hopeful that things will turn out as we expect and working very hard to make that reality. But that thesis of allowing more individuals to benefit, to participate and to benefit from capitalism is what I mean by doing capitalism a little differently.

Joel: 24:11

Yeah, you've mentioned a couple times, kind of doing it differently, and what I think is neat about that is that you know we have this idea. When you think about entrepreneurship, especially the startup world and all of that, one of the biggest values that gets extolled is innovation, you know kind of you know, figuring out a better way to do things, always kind of having that, that mentality we can always make it better, we can always do it better.

Joel: 24:35

But, when you mentioned you know kind of doing that to capitalism or to you know whatever the economic system is that suddenly becomes a little bit different of a conversation, because now it feels like it's not really talked about as innovation. It's talked about as, like you know, some radical, revolutionary thing. But it sounds like what you're saying is there's ways that we could actually evolve what we have now, rather than having to overthrow what we have now?

Lynier: 25:04

Again, that's optimism, right? That's what I hope is no future in pessimism, right? So the optimism really believes that we should look at the system that has served us well, right, you know I live in America. I'm a proud American. I'm a, you know, proud to participate in capitalists. I've benefited from, you know, my dad being an entrepreneur and sending us to college and, you know, buying a house using the GI Bill. So there's so many things that are good about our country.

Lynier: 25:36

I believe that I think there's opportunity for us to continue, as you said, to innovate, to look at things critically, to figure out how we address the systemic inequality and both racial wealth gap and, just, you know, income inequality the difference between the CEO making, you know, half a billion dollars a year and the average employee making $15, you know whatever $50 an hour and the lowest income employee making $15 an hour.

Lynier: 26:12

There's something about that that still makes me want to try to convince the $500 million person that hey, how about $200 million? And figure out strategies, not a gift not, it's not merit-based, clearly you earned it but how. I believe our economy would be better if you know more people had, you know, more income to be able to try here. I'll say it this way, and I joke about this all the time you know, I've made money and I've lost money, right. When I, in periods where I've made money, I've always had this thought of like you know, you get on the airplane, that's first class, right? People sit in first class and then people walk by to coach. Well, my dream and my definition of fun is getting on a plane with all of my investors and getting on a plane with people who've been supportive of my work, and we all are in first class, right, there's no coach, yeah, yeah.

Joel: 27:21

Right.

Lynier: 27:21

And again some of that can sound, you know, anti-capitalism in a way. I get it, but at least every now and then there should be a period where we, all you know, enjoyed the full benefits of the capitalism system of America.

Joel: 27:40

Well, and you know as someone who has sort of gone that same sort of route. So after I left nonprofits I did get into business. Took me a few years, but I started to find success. And you know, I wasn't, you know, the highest roller in the world, but I was making way more money than I ever thought I would. And I was, you know, and I was doing it on, you know, not too much time, like I kind of had some time for freedom to yes.

Lynier: 28:01

And once I got to that point, I realized like oh, this is actually now that I'm out of that, now that I'm out of that mode.

Joel: 28:07

I'm out of that like just crushing you know kind of weight of being broke all the time mode. Yes, I'm having to think about it, because the less money you have, the more you have to think about it.

Lynier: 28:18

Absolutely.

Joel: 28:18

And so because because of that and I had the resources to, I started doing things. Like you know, I got a massage and I like I got some acupuncture and I like went to therapy and I like actually started to be able to work on myself and grow as a person, because I wasn't in that constant survival mode and what I realized was so much of what I wanted was to be able to offer that to other people so that yeah like.

Joel: 28:45

of course, it's not that everyone should be given more. People add more, contribute more and should be compensated more for that, absolutely.

Lynier: 28:53

But I, I, I would love a business world, and I think it sounds like you would too, where you know you don't have to, you don't have to work two, three jobs, hustle just to still be in that survival mode and I think that, like you know, I don't feel like it should be too political to say that Correct, to say that that's exactly right and that again, that's the innovation that more people will think about it in a different way and be willing to even have. You know that conversation in a way that doesn't seem like you know we can make the pie bigger, that you know the fact that you know I make a little more of my team makes a little more money and you can all, you can do all of the risk reward. You know merit. I worked hard, but it does seem that there's a part of capitalism that needs to be done.

Joel: 29:54

Needs to think inclusively. That needs to be like another book I remember reading when I was coming up in business with mindset, by Carol Dweck.

Lynier: 30:01

Absolutely yes, great.

Joel: 30:03

So I'm wondering what you would. If you're thinking about having a growth mindset around our economics, what would that mean for you?

Lynier: 30:10

So for me, it's improving access to capital to, you know, individuals who have been denied for whatever reason and, again without apologizing, recognizing systemic issues, racial issues that have been a part of you know the American, you know history Right, so you know, creating both capital and support systems that allow more people to be entrepreneurial. That's my work at Rutgers. It's like, hey, you know, it's not just about the social programs. If we can figure out how to help more people think about business strategies, we can help more people get a business off the ground. If we can help more people get capital and get contract opportunities so that those business are sustainable, if we can help, you know, you know there's all these statistics around that if you just helped, you know, you know black owned businesses become employer firm, you know, to add one or two more employees to their you know, to their payroll that that'll have a you know a five. You know I think it was a five trillion dollar. You know impact on our economy.

Lynier: 31:24

I think I read in the report by you know, by one of the you know big financial houses. So that, to me, is where smart people, people with capital, people with you know that now have this philanthropically motivated, you know approach, you know the McKinsey scots of the world who are providing capital to projects. It's like there's a lane where providing capital to help other people generate wealth and keep wealth and get financial literacy and you know implement, you know buy their first home I mean all of those things are, you know, creating more wealth and creating more economic opportunity and again, I think they will pay long-term dividends to our country and ultimately the world over time.

Joel: 32:23

Yeah, you mentioned black owned businesses and obviously that was one thing that I loved about neighborhood economics is the focus on yes, we can make an ROI and we can invest locally. But we could also even do it on top of that into communities that have been redlined, that have been either, you know, overtaxed, that have been, you know, not allowed access to resources, whatever their you know ethnic background is. But I wanted to get your perspective a little bit because we've had on Bruce Waller a couple times, who's the director of Black Wall Street, asheville. That's here locally. They do a ton of awesome programs for black entrepreneurs and for other entrepreneurs of color. They've got some funding to like get some classes, to get some resources and all that kind of stuff. I am curious on the history of Black Wall Street a little bit because I know that this was something that there were lots of movements around the country in kind of the reconstruction time. Am I right on that?

Joel: 33:17

I'm curious if you could shed a little light on what happened to those movements and why they didn't. You know why it's had to be resurrected.

Lynier: 33:27

Yeah, so you know there was, you know, violence in American history, that you know some of those centers of commerce that were built and prospered because of just raw grit and ingenuity and cooperative economics in black communities that became these little sort of hubs and clusters of business activities that ultimately people start to refer to as Black Wall Street insurance company, there's a bank, there's a butcher, there's a lawyer, there's the doctor's office, all concentrated. Well, you know there's some great documentaries and a whole lot of articles and books, even about the violence that happened right, and that those communities were destroyed, either in racial issues, some of them were destroyed. Worked on a project in Minneapolis, st Paul, where you knowa mecca of black business called Brondo was, you know, a number of black-owned businesses, can't remember the exact number 200 or 300 black-owned businesses were removed by cost. There was a new highway system put in right, so it was again the system right. So that has happened a number of times, and so the reconstruction effort is now about A recognizing that history you know, celebrating in some respects the entrepreneurial ingenuity and the grit that was required to get these, you know mecca, you know little clusters of economic activity and community pride, you know, to make them viable and to successful and now really to learn, like how that happened, what new resources are available to reconstruct them. And the world has changed in some respect. Some of those places were walkable, you know. Now. You know people drive and shop at more regionally.

Lynier: 35:25

But the question now is well, all right, how do we identify, you know, black-owned businesses that are important to a community, our anchors, our places that gather, that have history, that employ people, that support the Little League Baseball team, you know, that have innovative projects and are employing you know a lot of folks? How do you help them continue to grow? How do we position them for opportunities, both? And then how do we also stimulate businesses that are really focused on next economy, like what's a growth sector? Right, a lot of the work you know I think about at Rutgers is how do we intentionally help more entrepreneurs of color, black entrepreneurs, think about growth sectors and start businesses in areas where you know, but I call next economy, where there is growth potential and where there is a more easier path to access in capital, right, so it's funny.

Lynier: 36:32

It's easier now to access capital for you know an industry in the green economy. It's easier to access capital for you know some tech, tech-enabled you know. It's easier to raise capital for even you know I was a blockchain than it is to raise capital for opening a new restaurant that has my grandmother's you know pound cake recipe, right, and so not that there's a denigration, right, there's a place for both. But my work is all right. We're gonna help the ice cream store and the cupcake maker and the one-man consultancy, you know, stay in business, but we also we have to be one, by the way yeah, yeah, yeah, got me hungry right, right, right.

Lynier: 37:16

But we're also going to help the entrepreneur really identify a growth sector. I joke sometimes that cannabis is a growth industry. Well, let's put some cannabis in those cupcakes Just somehow to think about. How do we continue to stimulate and to start businesses in the growth sector of our economy?

Joel: 37:40

Yeah, because when those businesses are grown from within the community. I was talking to Jeremiah Robinson about this with Mountain Business Works, a CDF five, that's down here, and he was talking about the difference between when a business comes from out of town, when a dollar store or a retail chain store comes into a community, versus when that business actually arises from within the community, and just how big of a difference it could make, I realized I didn't ask you.

Lynier: 38:08

where did you grow up? So I grew up in Chicago. I started my early life at West Side of Chicago and my parents owned a bar. I grew up in the community. They referred to us K-Town, or some people have called it West Garfield, but it's by the Bull Stadium on the West Side of the city, and then we moved to West of suburbs.

Lynier: 38:30

Yeah, just outside the loop, when we were about nine and 10, we moved to a little small, you know, entering suburb that was experiencing racial change and in 10 years it went from 10% black to 50% black and another 10 years is 70% 80% black. So that's my origin. I still have family in Chicago and in those neighborhoods.

Joel: 38:57

I love Chicago. It reminds me of a, so I think it's Anthony Bourdain who preferred to Chicago. He said it's big hearted and cold blooded.

Lynier: 39:05

I love it. Do you feel like that kind of shaped?

Joel: 39:07

your kind of attitude towards how you approach things.

Lynier: 39:11

Yeah, big hearted and cold blooded. I've never heard that said, but I like that thought of that. That's a very cool thing. Again, my approach has been I just remember, even though I remember my grandmother saying we had a very modest house on the West Side of Chicago and what I always remember her saying is even though we don't have a lot of money, we still can take pride in what we own. We mowed the grass, picked up trash, not only on our property but on the block, and not only in front of our house but in front of the neighbor's house. So that work is something that has been helpful to us.

Joel: 39:55

Yeah, I know that you have gotten to go to the previous neighborhood economics conferences and I know that you've been involved with the organization here for a while and your group the second center for urban entrepreneurship that you guys have done, a partner in neighborhood economics, I guess what did you get out of the last conferences that you've been to Like? What did you really walk away with that with?

Lynier: 40:25

Yeah, so I have great respect for the organizers of the Neighborhood Economic Development Conference.

Joel: 40:41

Kevin Jones his wife the leadership team they put together.

Lynier: 40:46

It's a really cool group of people that have inspiration to be able to move to bring this idea together. What was fun? So I went to the first two conferences. What has been fun about the conferences is A a focus on identifying projects that are ready for capital and then helping to illuminate those entrepreneurs, those investment funds that are ready for capital. So there's a portion of the work that's saying how do we get capital to scale ideas and the scale of entrepreneurs so that they can have greater impact? There were four or five individuals that were at the first conference and we all said, hey, we formed a vehicle, we have a track record, but we still are all struggling to raise the first 10 or 20 or $50 million of capital.

Lynier: 41:45

Neighborhood economics has really put an emphasis on how to help this co-ord of entrepreneurs raise capital. Trunch won. There's a trunch too that is very specific, related to grassroots economic development what the individual can do, what the church can do, what the local millionaire, how can they participate in strengthening parts of the city that need investment and entrepreneurs they can't. So to do that and to talk about black entrepreneurship without apology, to do that and think about new structures and try things or propose that pilot projects. That is the core of neighborhood economics and I'm hoping that it continues to grow.

Lynier: 42:44

First year I think it was maybe it was 200 people. Second year maybe it was 400 people, and these were entrepreneurs and philanthropic organizations and church leaders and political leaders and other community development organizations CDFIs and CDCs. So I'm hoping that it continues to build momentum, not just as a conference, but that over time you'll see those entrepreneurs who are ready for capital got capital. Those individuals who wanted to invest on a micro level $100 or $1,000 into these micro economic development funds had an opportunity to do it, that the little enterprises got formed, that the entrepreneurs got capital and training and education. I'm hoping that over the next five years or the decade that there'll be a lot of proof points that leaning into this and being intentional about neighborhood economic development and inclusive economic growth can be done in a way that makes our economy better and our country stronger.

Joel: 43:54

Yeah, I guess to go out here when you're talking to your students about this stuff, like what kind of message are you giving to them, the ones that get what you're about and want to follow in innovating and doing things differently?

Lynier: 44:14

It's so fun to tell people all the time that when I graduated from law school, I passed the bar exam, and it was such a tough exam that I remember sort of getting on my knees and, lord, if you let me pass this exam, I'll never go into any classroom ever again. And so when I came back to be a professor, I had to make sure I had to get right with my cover and I'm like well, I'm not praying for the exam, I'm sharing knowledge, and so it's a different part of the tape when I got right with the Lord on that. And so when I'm teaching my students what I'm core, what I'm sharing is, if you see problems in the world as business people, I teach in the business school.

Lynier: 44:57

Rutgers has a very highly regarded you know the Blousting School of Public Policy. I teach in the business school. So if you have a business mind and business acumen, you have access to resources and relationships. You can use all of that in a way that can make strategy and business ideas and implement programs and attract investment that can address the problems that are most perplexing or the problems that seem like government should be doing or someone else. That we can do it. And in fact, when we do do it, it's so incredibly rewarding financially rewarding, but also fulfilling in a way that is deep and very, very meaningful. Yeah.

Joel: 45:48

I love that. I can't think of a better way to close this out here. So thank you so much. Lanier Richardson We'll put links to his work in the show notes here and for all of you out there, check out Neighborhood Economics, check out Lanier's work and, obviously, subscribe to wherever you listen to your podcasts. And until next time, remember we are each other.