About Us
Community 21: Ten Years On
In 2001, at the start of a new century Australia’s community sector was facing a new landscape; Governments were turning to competitive tendering and the not-for-profit world was overly reliant on short-term funding.
A diverse group of 20 not-for-profit organisations came together and formed Community 21 to build a way to reduce their reliance on governments and short-term grant funding and increase their security by pooling resources and borrowing expertise from the for-profit world. In partnership with Bendigo Bank, Community 21 developed a specialised banking service to offer tailored products and financial services to the not-for-profit sector. This unique banking service is Community Sector Banking.
Community 21’s core purpose is to:
- Ensure the not for profit sector has access to capital and financial products;
- Support the robustness of the sector and its capabilities; and
- Support the sector in achieving social impact.
Community 21 actively takes on an advocacy role and participates at Federal and International level in issues that have an impact on the not-for-profit sector, such as the taxation of unrelated business activities; how to make funding structure maximise social impact.
