The Passion Behind Our Work
Who We Are
Creating positive impacts since 1994.
Craft3 is a nonprofit community development organization that uses capital, relationships, and voice to build a thriving, just and empowered Pacific Northwest. We invest in people, businesses, and communities, and work towards a future of shared prosperity across our region.
Our Approach
Craft3 is focused on helping communities create a future in which:
- Economic opportunities are ample and equitably distributed, and not a function of where you were born, your race, or your gender
- Economic progress is sustainable and its benefits broadly shared
- People and communities have the power and voice to shape their lives, make change, and realize their goals
We can’t do this alone. We invite your partnership, your accompaniment, your questions, and your support.
GUIDING PRINCIPLES
How We Work
While our primary tool for creating change is capital, Craft3 is more than a lender. We build relationships, connect unlikely partners, and tell the stories of the people and communities we serve. Through our three core strategies of Capital, Relationships, and Voice, we’re working to build a better, more inclusive Pacific Northwest.
Read our Strategic Plan, “Capital, Relationships, and Voice: Investing in Communities and Change.”
Our Focus
Regional Challenges
Craft3 focuses on three key challenges facing our region. Meeting these challenges will require systems change.
.01
Rural and Tribal Economies
Our region is not providing Tribal and rural communities with sufficient opportunities for economic growth and self-determination. We all suffer because of this.
Forests, fisheries, and other natural resources have made many fortunes in the Pacific Northwest. As unsustainable natural resource extraction has slowed, rural economies have had a hard landing and generally not experienced the prosperity and opportunities our cities have enjoyed. Craft3 works to change this.
We respond by:
- Investing in wealth and job creation in rural and tribal communities
- Building relationships and collaborations that propel forward-thinking, community-based leadership with strong visions for the future
- Amplifying the voices of rural and tribal communities in decision-making processes around the allocation of resources and policy development
.02
Systemic Racism
Our region is held back by racial inequities, many of which are legacies of a long history of racism and racist practices. These inequities hurt us all and prevent our region from reaching its full potential.
In the Pacific Northwest, race shapes economic opportunities and outcomes, as well as the circumstances people are born into. Black, brown and indigenous people have, on average, less wealth, less educational attainment, lower life expectancies, and lower rates of home ownership. Craft3 works to change this.
We respond by:
- Investing in wealth and job creation in rural and tribal communities
- Building relationships and collaborations with minority communities based on trust, accountability, power-sharing, and meaningful action
- Amplifying the voices of communities of color in decision-making and advocacy
- Striving to be an anti-racist organization
.03
Climate Crisis
Our region is threatened by a climate crisis that disproportionately impacts minorities and decreases quality of life and economic growth. This crisis is already causing droughts, heat waves, floods, and forest fires across the Pacific Northwest.
Not only does climate change disproportionately harm our most vulnerable populations — Native, minority and low-income communities — but also these populations are unlikely to have the resources to adapt to a changing climate or to benefit from the economic opportunities of climate adaptation. Craft3 works to change this.
We respond by:
- Investing in climate action and mitigation projects that create wealth and jobs, particularly within communities of color
- Building relationships and collaborations with partners who are committed to innovation in climate adaptation and mitigation and have strong connections to vulnerable communities
- Amplifying the voices of climate-vulnerable communities in decision-making and advocacy
Washington Community Investment Coalition
As the need for flexible, non-bank capital grew during the COVID pandemic, Craft3 helped convene CDFIs from across the region to advocate for a dedicated, public-sector investment that could meet this need.
Prosper Portland
Craft3’s long-standing relationship with Prosper Portland began in 2012 and it continues to this day with Craft3 and Prosper Portland partnering on the current AdvancingCities Portland project sponsored by JPMorgan Chase.
Clean Water Program
After more than a decade of lending to replace septic systems in Washington state, Craft3 worked with legislators and agency officials in Oregon to create a similar program.
Who We are
Our Story
Since 1994, Craft3 has focused on expanding access to capital by serving people and places not served by traditional financing.
While how we phrase our mission has evolved and our strategic toolbox has expanded, there’s been a remarkably consistent through-line to the why and how of our work.
Craft3 started in Ilwaco, Washington, at the mouth of the Columbia River. As the timber wars raged, environmentalists and loggers were locked in what seemed to be an intractable struggle. The founders of Craft3 saw the potential for community development finance to meet unmet community needs in a rural community making a difficult transition from an economy based on natural resource extraction.
By making loans that support people and places left out of the region’s prosperity, our founders thought they could use capital as a tool for social good – to help entrepreneurs, families and communities develop, grow stronger and determine their own futures. Craft3 has been doing just that ever since.
Since then, we’ve grown and added new capabilities, but we’ve always viewed our lending as a series of investments to help create a better future for our region.
See how Craft3 thinks about community development finance.
