Meet Lee Farmer

Lee (they/them) joins CCF as our new Deputy Director of Investment Strategy for the Community Ownership for Community Power fund. Lee brings 15 years of experience in impact investing and community development, most recently as Financing Director at the Nonprofit Finance Fund, where they managed over $60M in financing to advance racial equity and community ownership.

What brought you to CCF?

I was first introduced to CCF a few years ago through my work at Nonprofit Finance Fund, where I learned of the COCP Fund through our shared community and interests. I was so excited to hear about a fund that was truly created for and by community-owned organizations. I had seen for years the explosive growth of CLTs and co-ops in California, and the lack of adequate funding mechanisms to finance their growth. In the COCP fund, I saw an opportunity to align myself with a team and a fund that was aiming squarely to create those mechanisms, with a community governance model that is extraordinarily rare in the space. 

What drew you to movement work?

A belief that everyone deserves to have their needs met and that our collective liberation is bound in each other’s.  

How did you get into impact investing and community development?

As a young adult I saw the power that the financial system holds and felt a strong draw to figure out how to work within/around/underneath that system to shift power. My analysis of and language for how to do that has changed dramatically since I was 18, but that underlying draw has stayed with me. 

Why is community ownership important to you?

I believe that shifting away from models of private ownership to collective ownership will move us closer towards a vision of collective care and resiliency that I hold very dear to my heart. 

What inspires you to do this work? What brings you joy or sustains you in movement work?

Of course, the big wins are inspiring. But more realistically, it’s the day-to-day culture-shifting and culture-building I see around movement work that sustains me: a comrade that promises her neighbors she will make sure their kids are cared for in the case of an ICE raid; the lawyer that skills up on jail support in her “free time;” more and more free community meal groups popping up around the Bay;  the friend that will pick anyone up at the airport in the middle of night with snacks; or the artists that make sure the movement is filled with beautiful art and music.