$2 Million CU Donation Aims to Empower Wisconsin Black Community

Summit Credit Union’s largest donation to date – totaling $2 million – will go to a soon-to-open not-for-profit organization dedicated to building wealth and improving lives within the Black community in Madison, Wis.

The $4.9 billion, Cottage Grove, Wis.-based credit union announced its charitable gift to The Center for Black Excellence and Culture on Thursday. Summit was the first organization to contribute to the center, which is slated to open in 2023, the credit union said.

The $2 million donation helped The Center move closer to raising $36 million leading up to its opening – a goal stated on The Center’s website. It has raised a total of $5 million so far, with additional donations including payouts from Wisconsin’s Dane County and the city of Madison, and a federal earmark secured by Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) and Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), according to a Wisconsin State Journal report.

According to the new organization’s website, The Center for Black Excellence and Culture will educate Madison-based companies on how to attract and retain Black talent, as well as provide local Black professionals with opportunities to collaborate and build wealth. The Center’s programs and initiatives will cover four focus areas: Health and wellness, leadership and innovation, performing and arts visuals, and youth and families.

Racial disparities in Dane County, where Madison is located, are among Wisconsin’s most extreme, and the state has been named one of the country’s worst states for Black people, according to The Center. Specific statistics listed by The Center that support the need to uplift Madison’s Black community include:

• Wisconsin’s Black families are five times more likely than white families to live in poverty;
• In 2018, 61% of Black households in Dane County had income near or below the poverty line; and
• There were more established Black-owned businesses in Dane County 75 years ago than today.

In addition, The Center noted that over the last 30 years, its leaders have seen Madison’s Black youth leave the city once they reach adulthood. Rev. Dr. Alex Gee – a lifelong Madison resident, pastor of Fountain of Life Church in Madison, founder/CEO of the nonprofit Nehemiah Center of Urban Leadership and host of the podcast “Black Like Me” – is spearheading plans for the multi-million dollar organization.

“This Black-led, Black-inspired and Black-designed center aims to create a space that uplifts the Black community and Black-owned businesses, especially those run by women,” Summit President/CEO Kim Sponem stated. “The time is now for all of us to join the Black community to transform Madison from one of the worst cities for Blacks to live in, to one of the best.”

She added that Summit “strongly supports the center’s unique blend of building Black wealth in its planned incubator and co-working spaces, and its art events and community services spaces.”

The facility will be built on a 3.5-acre plot of land on the 700 block of West Badger Road in Madison’s historic Black neighborhood of South Park Street, and will serve as a component of a number of local projects designed to counteract potential gentrification, The Center said.