NADBank & the Community Adjustment and Investment Program

The original research agenda that led to the creation of the NAID Center was also the bases for the formation of the North American Development Bank (NAD Bank).  Dr. Raul Hinojosa- Ojeda, Founder and Research Director of the NAID Center, is recognized as the intellectual author of the NAD Bank, which is a three billion-dollar, bi-national institution created as a part of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994 under the legislative leadership of former Congressman Esteban Torres.  Capitalized in equal parts by the United States and Mexico, the NAD Bank was established for the purpose of financing environmental infrastructure projects along the U.S.-Mexico Border.  The NAID Center collaborated with the NAD Bank in its early days as we worked with the border communities of Naco, Arizona, and Naco, Sonora on a wastewater project which was one of the first such projects approved by the Border Environmental Cooperation Commission.

The NAD Bank also provided a domestic window to assist communities impacted by NAFTA through the Community Adjustment and Investment Program (CAIP), under the control of the U.S. Treasury Department. The NAID Center participated in every step of the development of the CAIP, including calculating the impacts of NAFTA on communities in the United States and updating and maintaining related databases used for certification.  The NAID Center was also a founding member of the NAD Bank Technical Assistance Consortium, a group that included the National Council of La Raza and the William C. Velásquez Research Institute.  Funded by the U.S. government, the Consortium attempted to make the CAIP into a viable program for assistance to NAFTA-impacted communities.

The NAID Center performed research on a range of projects for the NAD Bank Consortium, including developing Internet capacity for technical assistance in community economic development, post-NAFTA development of the Los Angeles garment industry, expansion of the nursery industry in South Florida, and training for the metal-working industry in Chicago. Working in conjunction with the NAD Bank-CAIP, the NAID Center also developed a pilot project for community economic development in Watsonville, California, which led to the first loan to a financial intermediary (California Coastal Rural Development Corporation) by the CAIP.