WASHINGTON, DC-Washington DC is an active player in the nation's charter school community, which means Bank of America Merrill Lynch's community development operations are active here as well.
The bank's big project for the year, to date, is the Washington Latin Public Charter School, a highly competitive school to which Bank of America Merrill Lynch is providing more than $12 million in loans and $18 million in New Market Tax Credit investments to help the school build a new campus for its middle and high school programs.
In addition, the bank just made a separate $6.1 million commitment to another charter school institution in the District – a school for adult continuing education.
"DC is a leader in charter schools with some 43% of District public school students attending charter schools," notes Priya Jayachandran, senior vice president of Community Development Banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. "It is the first place we were active for charter school lending," she tells GlobeSt.com.
Charter school lending is not a high-volume business, compared to other real estate asset classes. Bank of America Merrill Lynch has made only two other charter school loans in the country this year—one in Arizona and one in Florida. It is continuing to work on other opportunities in the DC market, Jayachandran says.
Charter school lending is only one part of the bank's community development platform. Affordable housing is another component. In general, Bank of America Merrill Lynch has provided more than $1.6 billion in community loans for the first half of 2013, which will in result create more than 6,500 affordable housing units.
Charter schools, though, seem to be the institution's baby right now.
"We are excited about the increased lending we are doing with charter schools now and with the activity they are generating in the communities," Maria Barry, Community Development Banking Executive at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, tells GlobeSt.com. "We have seen a bit of an increase in market share and overall business activity, which has a lot to do with our strategy."
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