While opportunity zoneinvestments have become wildly popular, the core values of theinvestment model call for social impact investing. CatalystOpportunity Zone Funds has created a social impactscorecard to ensure it is meeting both community and investmentneeds on opportunity zone projects. The scorecard measure the needsof the community, ensure those needs are met with the project anddelivers market-rate returns to investors.

"We have an impact scores card and measurement framework that weinvested a lot of time and energy to create over the last six tonine months," Jeremy Keele, managing director atCatalyst, tells GlobeSt.com. "It does a few things. On the onehand, it identifies community needs in a particular zip code orcensus track. That could mean that local residents don't havehealthy, nutritious foods from a grocery store or that there areaffordability issues for housing. The second part is an impactunderwriting assessment tool that allows us to under stand how theproject will address the needs. That receives an objective scorebased on a data set that we have access to."

In addition to weighing social needs when identifying andunderwriting opportunities, the firm's model also tracks theongoing needs and impact of the investment. "The third piece is anongoing reporting and measurement tool and how the community isevolving over time and how our investment is moving the needle overtime," says Keele.