Dear Friends of HOPE

Inspired by U.S. Congresswoman and friend Diane E. Watson, who advised me years ago to always provide an “annual accounting” of our activities, work product and performance to the public, I am writing today to provide you with a brief “2010 Report Card” on the work of Operation HOPE.

In the backdrop of this global economic crisis it appears that our work is more relevant than ever, and going forward we believe that financial literacy, or what we at HOPE call “the language of money,” will emerge post-crisis as the new civil rights issue here in America (capitalism for the people), and the first global “silver rights” empowerment tool for a new generation. It is with this in mind that Operation HOPE was honored to accept an invitation from Dr. King’s historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, and from its current pastor, Reverend Dr. Raphael Warnock, to build the HOPE Financial Literacy Empowerment Center at Ebenezer, scheduled for completion later this year.

The HOPE Center at Ebenezer will serve as the anchor tenant for the new Martin Luther King, Sr. Community Resource Center, in honor of one known as “Daddy King.” The HOPE Center, Ebenezer is also a centerpiece commitment tied to our 5-year framework agreement with the Financial Services Roundtable, and lead partners for the HOPE Center, Ebenezer include SunTrust, State Farm Insurance, LPL Financial, Wells Fargo, MasterCard, the Coca-Cola Company and the U.S. Economic Development Administration.

HOPE has also launched a groundbreaking partnership with the Gallup Organization, introducing the new Gallup-Operation HOPE Financial Literacy Index, and with it launching the new HOPE Office of Innovation, Research & Assessment. We believe that this metric will allow philanthropy to be measured for the first time in under-served communities. We are honored to have the Index featured as a best practice before the U.S. Financial Literacy Education Commission (FLEC) at the U.S. Treasury Department on January 26, 2011.

On the ground, HOPE focuses on making sure this crisis never impacts future generations by educating youth in financial literacy empowerment. To date Banking on Our Future has educated 535,000, with 95,000 educated in 2010 alone. Drawing from leaders and workers from a broad cross section of community, our HOPE Corps of volunteers have trained and mobilized 12,500 volunteers to date and 3,000 in 2010 alone.

Looking to empower adults with silver rights and financial and economic empowerment, our HOPE Financial Literacy Empowerment Centers have created and maintained 2,872 individual loans at $664.4 million homeownership and small business wealth and opportunity to date, and 276 individual loans at $84.1 million in 2010 alone.

HOPE Coalition America continues to provide emergency economic disaster response and recovery services. Two examples of HCA’s work include our Mortgage HOPE Crisis Hotline which has amended, restructured and/or modified over $395 million representing 1,343 individuals in mortgages. In 2010 alone, we have counseled over 30,000 individuals to date, and modified $78.9 million, representing 253 individuals and provided credit and foreclosure prevention counseling to over 6,000 clients. Our Project Restore HOPE Initiative continues to serve those in the Gulf region, in the backdrop of both Hurricane Katrina and the BP spill, serving 135,000 to date and 3,600 in 2010 alone. HOPE Global Initiatives has deepened its work in South Africa, where we have served 20,629 to date and 9,619 in 2010, and in 2010 we launched HOPE, Haiti, to assist after the devastating earthquake there.

Together HOPE has served more than 1.25 million people to date, maintains approximately 3,000 partners from government, community and the private sector, serves 70 urban communities in the U.S., along with South Africa and Haiti, and has to date directed more than $900 million in economic activity into and within under-served communities since our founding immediately following the Rodney King riots of 1992.

Finally, 2010 saw my book LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), which is essentially the love story of Operation HOPE, reach the CEO Read-Inc. Magazine Business Bestseller List a total of 12 months since its publishing in August, 2009, proceeds benefiting Operation HOPE.

Thank you for all of your support in 2010, and look forward to “doing more” with and through your inspired confidence in 2011 and beyond.

Onward and…

With HOPE,

– Posted by John Hope Bryant

John Hope Bryant is the founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE and Bryant Group Companies, Inc., author of bestselling business book LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), and member of the U.S. President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability

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