Connect on Social Media
LinkedIn:
Twitter:
Website:
My Badges
About
First Name:
Last Name:
Title and Organization:
Chief Executive Officer, HOPE (Hope Credit Union / Hope Enterprise Corporation / Hop Policy Institute)
Bio:
William J. (Bill) Bynum is the founding Chief Executive Officer of HOPE (Hope Enterprise Corporation, Hope Credit Union and Hope Policy Institute), a family of organizations dedicated to strengthening the financial health of people in under resourced Deep South communities. Since 1994, HOPE’s efforts have benefitted more than three million people in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee, while shaping policies and practices that have improved conditions in opportunity deserts nationwide.
Born in New York City, and raised in Bynum, North Carolina, he earned his B.A. in Political Science and Psychology at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, and is a recipient of the university’s Distinguished Alumnus Award. Bynum began his professional career in North Carolina by helping to establish Self-Help, a pioneer in the development finance industry, and later built nationally recognized programs at the NC Rural Economic Development Center.
A member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, Henry Crown Fellow, Emerson Collective Dial Fellow and Salzburg Global Fellow, Bynum serves on an array of boards including the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta - New Orleans branch, Aspen Institute, NAACP Legal & Education Defense Fund, Black Vision Fund, Deep South Today, Acumen America, and Hope Credit Union, and as an advisor to Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo and E Pluribus Unum. Bynum previously served as a member of the Gates Foundation’s U.S. Partnership on Mobility from Poverty, and a Towsley Policymaker in Residence at the University of Michigan Gerald Ford School of Public Policy.
Appointed by President George W. Bush, Bynum chaired the Community Development Advisory Board, and chaired the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Consumer Advisory Board during the Obama Administration, served as a member of the Biden-Harris Presidential Transition Team, and on the U.S. Treasury Department’s Advisory Committee on Racial Equity.
Bynum has received the John W. Gardner Leadership Award, Heinz Award, McNulty Prize, the Myrlie & Medgar Evers Voices of Courage & Justice Award, and an honorary degrees from Talladega College and Tougaloo College.
Fellowship Program
Class
