Baptist conventions support plan to finance new homes for blacks in big cities

More than 150,000 low-and moderate-income homes will be financed through a non-profit enterprise, the Minority Enterprise Financial Acquisition Corporation (MEFAC), organized by two major Black Baptist conventions and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp (Freddie Mac).

At a D.C. press conference, Freddie Mac officials announced the establishment of MEFAC to increase minority homeownership and focus the resources of the 12.7 million members of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. and the National Baptist Convention of America, Inc. on expanding homeownership in Black communities.

Aligned with the economic program will be HomeFree, a Washington, D.C.-based, not-for-profit group, that will educate and prepare the potential homeowners through a network of churches and religious social service organizations dubbed a "Crusade for Homeownership."

The two combines are scheduled to work in certain targeted communities to help as many as 12,000 families become homeowners by the end of 1997 and another 138,000 families by the end of the decade in 50 to 65 markets.

The targeted communities in the first phase of the agreements include Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Cleveland, Dallas, Shreveport, LA, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Kansas City, MO and Kansas City, KS.

The president and executive director of the MEFAC operation is Dr. Hyman I. Jarrett, pastor of the Sunflower Baptist Church in Leavenworth, KS. He said, "This is an exciting project for Baptists. We can change our neighborhoods and congregations by more homeownership."

This program marks the first time that Freddie Mac, a stockholder-owned corporation chartered by Congress to create a flow of funds to mortgage lenders, has attempted to directly help the Black community.