Fund 17 is a non-profit organization that provides financial opportunity, education, and empowerment to micro-entrepreneurs in all seventeen wards of New Orleans. Through personalized relationships, we provide our entrepreneurs with business development services and personal finance education to transition them into the formal economic system, where their assets are protected and can grow. Since the financial collapse of 2008, the world has increasingly shifted its attention to global income inequality and the predatory approaches present in the financial world. On the local level, New Orleans consistently displays higher levels of inequality than national averages. Nearly 40% of New Orleans is not properly served by financial insitutions. Fund 17 believes that by extending financial resources and opportunities to all income brackets, we can bridge gaps and take down poverty in the world’s richest society.