ATLANTA – Citizens Trust Bank (CTB) and Operation HOPE today announced an expanded, transformational partnership, including a collaborative program HOPE Inside coaching, that connects Citizens Trust Bank employees, deserving consumers, and businesses to one-on-one debt counseling, financial coaching, education, and Citizens Trust Bank (CTB) solutions, as a part of the bank’s commitment to bring access and solutions to build better lives and communities.
Citizens Trust Bank and Operation HOPE will expand their community-based approach to financial wellness to provide more people with the education, insights, and tools that will empower and build better lives. To achieve this goal, Citizens Trust Bank and Operation HOPE have entered into a partnership that will expand and transform HOPE Inside coaching, bringing in-person and virtual financial coaching, educational content, and solutions to the Citizens Trust Bank financial center network.
“When two different entities come together who hold a common commitment to uplift communities through education, awareness, and programs anchored in financial literacy, it is a collective win for all,” says Cynthia N. Day, President & CEO, Citizens Trust Bank. “And when this alignment is implemented and successfully expanded to a national level we can deepen our impact with a broader number of consumers and businesses to reverse the negative trends in Black and Brown communities,” said Day.
Citizens Trust Bank and Operation HOPE’s expanded partnership includes:
- Transforming and expanding the HOPE Inside coaching program to be community-based and impact-focused, encompassing hub location serving in communities across the Citizens Trust Bank Atlanta market.
- Collaborating to further the Citizens Trust Bank employee wellness platform with HOPE coaching and CTB programming.
- Becoming a 2022 Member of HOPE to build consumer and business financial capacity and sustainability.
“I am honored to have Citizens Trust Bank’s commitment to furthering Operation HOPE’s mission to bring financial literacy to its major stakeholders, employees, and consumers,” said Operation HOPE Founder, Chairman, and CEO, John Hope Bryant. “Cynthia Day, and the leading voices behind Citizens Trust Bank, believed in our vision to support the dreams of aspiring Black entrepreneurs. As a Minority depository institution (MDI) located here in Atlanta, we are thrilled to align our service offerings and collaborate to strengthen communities through financial wellness and education.”
For thirty years, Operation HOPE has been pioneering programs that deliver economic self- sufficiency through innovative partnerships with the public and private sectors. Its HOPE Inside model was the first-of-its-kind in the banking sector, and the first nonprofit allowed to sit inside of a bank branch.
To learn more, go to www.ctbconnect.com or visit an Operation HOPE financial coach at the Citizens Trust Bank.
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About Citizens Trust Bank
Celebrating over 100 years in the community, Citizens Trust Bank remains committed to providing personalized service and financial solutions to meet the growing needs of the community. Through a legacy built on economic equality and well-being, we go beyond meeting the needs of offering banking solutions; our mission is to empower our customers and future generations for financial success. The bank takes pride in offering its financial solutions throughout metropolitan-Atlanta and Birmingham and Eutaw, Alabama. Through its parent company, Citizens Bancshares Corporation, the Bank offers its common stock over-the-counter to the public under the trading symbol CZBS and can be found at www.ctbconnect.com. Follow the financial literacy impact conversations on Facebook, Instagram, Linked In, and Twitter.
About Operation HOPE, Inc.
Since 1992, Operation HOPE has been moving America from civil rights to “silver rights” with the mission of making free enterprise and capitalism work for the underserved—disrupting poverty for millions of low and moderate-income youth and adults across the nation. Through its community uplift model, HOPE Inside, which received the 2016 Innovator of the Year recognition by American Banker magazine, Operation HOPE has served more than 4 million individuals and directed more than $3.2 billion in economic activity into disenfranchised communities—turning check-cashing customers into banking customers, renters into homeowners, small business dreamers into small business owners, minimum wage workers into living wage consumers, and uncertain disaster victims into financially empowered disaster survivors. For more information: www.OperationHOPE.org. Follow the HOPE conversation on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
Media Contacts:
Diedra L. St. Julien, Citizens Trust Bank 404.575.8371
Lalohni Campbell, Operation HOPE 404-593-7145