The Community Development Movement Lost one of its legendary leaders on April 28 when Charles "Chuck" Grigsby passed away.

Chuck's contributions to the Community Development field's birth and growth over the past nearly 50 years represent a legacy that will be remembered for a long time. It was Mel King who was the state representative that led the campaign to create the state’s community development infrastructure in the 1970s. It was Chuck Grigsby who was hired to transform that vision into reality by serving as the founding executive director of the Community Development Finance Corporation in the 1970s. 

Later, after community groups (including MACDC, MAHA and others) successfully won passage of legislation to require insurance companies to make community investments, the life insurance industry also turned to Chuck to make that dream a reality by hiring him to be the founding executive director of the Life Initiative in the 1990s. And once again when the Deval Patrick Administration merged CDFC with another state quasi-public entity to create the Massachusetts Growth Capital Corporation in 2010, they turned to Chuck to lead the merger and create a new, stronger, and more impactful agency.  He also served as the director of the Public Facilities Departments (now the Department of Neighborhood Development) for the City of Boston in the 1990s during the Thomas Menino Administration. 

To each of these roles, Chuck brought his extraordinary intelligence, leadership, creativity, and commitment. The results speak for themselves. Chuck was someone that I deeply admired from the start of our relationship in the 1990s when he helped us create the CDC Community Business Network, an innovative model for shared staffing and collaboration that was built in close partnership with the City of Boston. I clearly remember the meeting where Chuck laid out his vision. We all nodded in agreement. Later, I had the pleasure of working closely with Chuck as he built the Life Initiative into a critical player in the community development field - not an easy task given the insurance industry's lack of familiarity with our field. Finally, I had one more opportunity to see Chuck in action when he took the helm at MGCC where I serve on the Board of Directors. The success and impact of MGCC in responding to the pandemic over the past year (for which we recently gave them an award) can be traced directly to the culture and foundation that Chuck built during those early years. Over the course of our relationship, I learned a great deal from Chuck about finance, public service, politics, leadership and how to live life to the fullest (learn more about his many hobbies in this terrific Boston Globe article).

The Massachusetts Community Development movement is incredibly fortunate to have had many great leaders over the decades. Today, we walk on their shoulders and none were broader and stronger than those of Chuck Grigsby. May his memory be a blessing.