THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27
7:30 AM – 8:30 AM | Breakfast & Registration
Ad Hoc Discussions – Please see your program insert for ad hoc information
7:30 AM – 8:30 AM | Special Breakfast Sessions
Investing in the Future of Puerto Rico
Please join Islanders for a spirited early morning conversation about how to partner with local businesses and investment managers. This will be a discussion on both the grantmaking and investment sides of the balance sheet. Please feel free to bring your questions, ideas, and willingness to build connections!
Speakers:
Ramphis Castro, Co-Founder and General Partner, ScienceVest (Moderator)
Luis Alberto Ferré Rangel, Chief Social Innovation Officer, Grupo Ferré Rangel
Karina Claudio Betancourt, Director, Open Society Foundations’ Puerto Rico Project
Adrian Franco, Ph.D., Officer & Director of Community Development Finance (CoDeFi), Federal Reserve Bank of New York
8:45 AM – 9:00 AM | Morning Welcome
Ivan Frishberg, Director, Impact Policy, Amalgamated Bank & Confluence Board Member
9:00 AM – 10:00 AM | Plenary Session
Leveraging Foundation Capital
Organized with the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and Mercer
To achieve a just, equitable, and more sustainable future for all will require substantial private capital—most of which is located primarily in developed economies, while the need for that capital is centered in relatively low-returning assets (e.g., developed-market renewable energy) or high-risk jurisdictions (e.g., emerging and frontier economies). Blended finance approaches have been increasingly used to facilitate investments into both developed and emerging economies by reducing risks and/or enhancing returns for investors; however, more catalytic capital is needed to both unlock and scale up impact investments to the level needed. In this session, panelists will discuss potential ways to better coordinate the provision of catalytic capital from foundations, family offices, and development finance institutions with significant investments by relatively impact-agnostic asset owners in deal structures that advance a range of investor and stakeholder interests. Our goal is to help everyone to find their role.
Speakers:
Christine Bradford, Principal and Senior Investment Consultant, Mercer (moderator)
Adam Connaker, Principal Innovative Finance, The Rockefeller Foundation
Adrian Franco, Ph.D., Officer & Director of Community Development Finance (CoDeFi), Federal Reserve Bank of New York
Lori Scott, Chief Credit Officer, The MacArthur Foundation
10:00 AM - 10:30 AM | Gender and Climate Intersect to Find Solutions at Companies
As policymakers stall to respond to climate change, investors turn to markets for signals and solutions. At the vanguard of the companies moving the needle on climate change are women. Join us for spirited discussion between two industry leaders for an inside view about how companies are tackling climate solutions.
Georgie Benardete, Co-Founder and CEO, Align 17
Lynelle Cameron, President & CEO, Autodesk Foundation
10:30 AM - 10:45 AM | Honorary Keynote: Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz Soto
11:00 AM – 12:15 PM | Concurrent Traditional Sessions (Choose one)
Tales from the Fire: Place-Based Climate Investing for a Just Transition
Organized with Coastal Enterprises Inc (CEI)
The benefits of climate action align with many investors’ focuses on rural and urban economies, environmental justice, and resilience of low-income communities. However, opportunities that align investor needs with viable solutions are few. In this session, we will review three local deals through the lens of a CDFI, a place-based foundation and international investment fund manager. Together they will examine how to leverage capital based upon fair transition principles. The session will highlight the value of place-based knowledge, technical assistance, and enabling policy in helping advance clean energy investment.
Speakers:
Catherine Godschalk, Vice President of Investments, Calvert Impact Capital (Moderator)
Dr. Nelson Colon, President, Puerto Rico Community Foundation
John Egan, Chief Investment Officer, Coastal Enterprises Inc (CEI)
Justin Maxson, Executive Director, Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation
Eradicating Poverty by Working with Policy
Organized with Libra Foundation
The fact that virtually all of Puerto Rico has qualified as an Opportunity Zone (OZ) is a stark reminder of the persistent, omnipresent US contradiction of deep poverty amidst great wealth and resources. Does the OZ approach offer the desired balance of positive return for both investors and communities? What other examples of programs are there that facilitate investment in ways that promote sustainable and equitable economic development? This session will dive deeper into the evolving geography of poverty and into the ways that federal or local programs can further equitable economic development.
Speakers:
Lisa Mensah, President & CEO, Opportunity Finance Network (Moderator)
Andrew Harris, Principal, North Sky Capital
Jerry Maldonado, Director of Cities and States, Ford Foundation
David Sand, Chief Impact Strategist, Community Capital Management
Morgan Simon, Founding Partner, Candide Group, Libra Foundation
Shades of Grey: Investing for a Paradigm Shift
Organized with Nia Community Foundation
As the impact investing space grows and moves mainstream, how can we ensure we are having the desired effects? This session features Confluence members that have moved the financial system by investing in diverse teams that direct money to entrepreneurs, and to segments of our economy that have previously been neglected by the current economic system. We will discuss ways to evaluate potential investments with a social justice lens that pivots paradigms. Our speakers will share stories, techniques, and examples of investments that have shifted the investing landscape in big and small ways. This session will offer unique viewpoints and illustrate varying types of investments among asset classes that redirect the economic outcomes toward inclusion and sustainability.
Speakers:
Kristin Hull, Founder, Nia Community Foundation (Moderator)
Jim Chowdry, Program Manager, Confluence Philanthropy
Tracy Gray, Trustee, California State University Dominguez Hills Foundation (CSUDH)
Resilience is the New Sustainability
Organized with Natural Investments, Tides, and Root Capital
The climate crisis is here, and rapidly implementing effective adaptation and resilience strategies is among the world’s most urgent challenges—especially for the most vulnerable populations who did little to cause this crisis, but now must face its consequences. Join us for a discussion to better understand what resilience means with the help of some frameworks, and to self-identify synergies in each of our work. We will have deep conversations around resilience in agriculture and energy systems, in addition to perspectives around capital access and policy environment.
Speakers:
Peter Martin, Philanthropic Director, Tides (Moderator)
Michael Kramer, Managing Partner, Natural Investments
Arturo Massol-Deyá, Founder, Casa Pueblo
Amy Mullen, Chief Development Officer, Root Capital
Building a Movement: Financial Activists Leveraging Capital to Effect Real Change
Organized with RSF Social Finance
To move the needle forward on issues including racial justice, climate change, and our challenged economic system, the world needs financial activists willing to think about capital—resources that are both financial and human—in bold, complex, and creative ways. Learn what it’s going to take in discussion between visionary financial leaders who are effecting real change.
Speakers:
Donna Daniels, Director, Client Engagement, RSF Social Finance (Moderator)
Tory Dietel Hopps, Managing Partners, Dietel & Partners
Nina Robinson, Director, The Runway Project Oakland
12:15 PM - 1:30 PM | Lunch for those not attending fieldtrips
Post-Conference
12:30 PM - 5:00 PM | Field Trips (Prior Registration Required)
Choose from four off-site field trips at Conference registration. Field trips will conclude at 5pm, returning to the hotel around 6pm. Lunch will be provided during the field trip. Dinner is not included in registration. Note that the Decolonizing Wealth Workshop is on site and begins at 12:30pm with a private lunch.
1) Decolonizing Wealth: How to Use Money as Medicine: A Special Workshop with Author, Edgar Villanueva
This workshop will be held at the El San Juan Hotel and begins at 12:30pm
Decolonizing Wealth Workshop: You loved the best-selling book, now you can join award-winning author Edgar Villanueva for the premier of his Decolonizing Wealth workshop in Puerto Rico! In this post-conference afternoon intensive, you will learn more about the concept of ‘colonization’ and how this dynamic may show up in your work. During this session we will craft personal commitments to building processes for healing by changing the ways in which we partner with disadvantaged communities. You will leave inspired to integrate the ‘Seven Steps to Healing’ into your own leadership style, with concrete ideas about how you can motivate others to be stronger allies and partners to those we long to serve.
Workshop Trainers:
Edgar Villanueva, Bestselling Author, Decolonizing Wealth
Vanessa Roanhorse, CEO, Roanhorse Consulting
2) Investing in a Just Transition in Puerto Rico: An Estuary Exploration by Boat
Join practitioners in a shared learning opportunity to explore local solutions to resilience among communities in the environmentally degraded Caño Martín Peña neighborhood, a 3.5-mile long natural tidal channel that is part of the San Juan Bay Estuary. The region is the only tropical estuary within the EPA's National Estuary Program, and was among the most affected regions during Hurricanes Irma and María. The trip, in partnership with Proyecto ENLACE, a prominent non-profit, and Excursiones ECO, a community micro-enterprise committed to the restoration of Caño Martín Peña and San Juan Bay Estuary, will include a boat trip through the estuary to discuss the area history, followed by a bus tour that explores various neighborhood interventions.
Tour Leaders:
Melba Ayala, Co-founder, Excursiones ECO
Dan Chu, Executive Director, Sierra Club Foundation
Mario Núñez Mercado, Executive Director, Corporación del Proyecto ENLACE
Lucy Cruz Rivera, President, G-8
Estrella D. Santiago Pérez, J.D., Environmental Affairs Manager, Corporación del Proyecto ENLACE
3) Investing in Island Entrepreneurship
The last decade has seen the emergence of new vision and commitment to local economic development. The Puerto Rico Science, Technology and Research Trust, a small business incubator and accelerator in Santurce, houses an intensive training program and venture fund for high-impact start-ups. Also offered is a local pre-acceleration program focused on helping early-stage Puerto Rican startups that have global potential, to get to market. Field trip participants will hear from entrepreneurs and key partners nurturing investment innovation. The trip will be flexibly structured to enable those who wish to remain after the first half to further engage, while others will be able to depart and walk to La Placita, the 100-year old market that anchors food and nightlife– where we host the trip’s final half hour debrief.
Tour Leaders:
Ricardo Burgos, Consultant, Puerto Rico Science, Technology and Research Trust
Marie Custodio, Outreach Manager, Parallel 18
Andreica Maldonado, Grants Program Director, Puerto Rico Science, Technology and Research Trust
4) Exploring the Investable Landscape: Hike El Yunque National Forest
The IPCC report “Climate Change & Land,” released in August 2019, emphasized the critical role of land management to curtail the impending climate crises. This report was a call to action for investors to mobilize capital towards land based climate solutions. With the world’s forests at the heart of those solutions, this field trip will take attendees on a hiking tour through trails of 28,000 Acre El Yunque National Forest, the only tropical rain forest in the US. The trip will be led by a local tour guide, with expert investor insights from EcoTrust.
Tour Leaders:
Kim Foley, Director, Investor Relations, Ecotrust Forest Management (EFM)
Jorge A. Montalvo, Professional Tour Guide Founder, Patria Tours
Dr. Tamara Heartsill Scalley, Research Ecologist, International Institute of Tropical Forestry
5) How a Disaster Seeded a Local Food Movement
Organized with the Ocean Foundation
Hurricanes Irma and Maria destroyed an estimated 80% of Puerto Rico’s crops and farmland. However, Puerto Rico has continued to develop its food economy, increasing the amount of locally grown food on the island. How are these after effects a model for ecological resilience, sustainability, and community empowerment? This field trip will feature local producers with a unique story to offer investors, relevant to Puerto Rico and beyond. Conservación Con Ciencia will guide our visit to the Naguabo Fishing Cooperative, a commercial fishing cooperative that has made fishing more sustainable from the catch to consumption. Participants will gain a comprehensive view of the strengths and challenges for local fishermen and residents more than two years after the natural disasters.
Tour Leaders:
Jason Donofrio, External Relations Officer, Ocean Foundation
Raimundo Espinoza, Founder and Executive Director, Conservación ConCiencia
Isabel Rullán, Co-Founder and Executive Director, ConPRmetidos
Naguabo Fishing Cooperative