On Saturday, October 17, John Hope Bryant, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Operation HOPE, took the stage in Buffalo for Building a Way Forward, a morning event hosted by the Buffalo Federation of Neighborhood Centers at 2365 Main Street. Tickets were offered at no cost, every dollar of support went to the organization’s work, and adults in the room received a book to take home.

Ten days earlier, John sat down with host Jay Moran on BTPM NPR’s What’s Next? to talk about what he sees in Buffalo and what he believes the city can become. He had visited earlier this year for Buffalo Black Business Month, and the conversation picked up where that visit left off. Here is that conversation, edited for length. You can also press play and hear all of it.

When you look at Buffalo, what do you see?

I see a city that is missing the basics. These are not poor people. Every legitimate fortune in America started with someone the world called poor. Sam Walton was a high school educated storekeeper who got told no by his landlord and his city, moved to a town that encouraged him, and built the largest retailer on earth. What I see in Buffalo is untapped human potential.

You cannot have block after block where the average credit score is 500, 550, or 580 and expect economic activity to follow. The business model on those blocks becomes the check casher, the payday lender, the rent-to-own store, the title lender, the pawn shop. Giving people money does not fix that if nothing changes in their mindset and their financial skills. About 70 percent of lottery winners are broke within five years.

How much can a credit score really change?

It changes how long you live. Every 50-point increase in a credit score adds about five years of life. I pulled up the Operation HOPE Community Credit Score Index for Buffalo while we were talking. Schiller Park, zip code 14211, averages a 624. West Seneca, 14224, averages a 725. Those two neighborhoods are less than nine miles apart. Homeownership is about 45 percent in one and 76 percent in the other, and life expectancy is 70 years against 80. That’s not my opinion, that’s data.

Once a score reaches 700, the mindset changes. A renter becomes a homeowner, and a homeowner hires the painter, the landscaper, and the roofer, pays property taxes, and starts thinking about a small business. If you raise credit scores in Buffalo by 100 points, you change Buffalo.

What is already working?

HOPE Inside. The most powerful trip I took to Buffalo was the day I came with KeyBank CEO Chris Gorman to open a HOPE Inside location. As far as I know, we are the only nonprofit ever allowed to operate inside a bank branch. Chris wants more customers and he cannot say yes to a 500 credit score. When our coaches help someone reach 680 or 700, he can. Clients also save money, pay down expensive debt, and many discover tax credits they never claimed.

Who needs to hear this message?

Your mayor, your county and state officials, your chamber of commerce, your biggest employers, and your banks. They should either debunk it or embrace it. I made the same case in West Virginia with the mayor of Huntington and the wealthiest man in the state, and they decided to run a demonstration project, cordoning off several blocks to raise credit scores. I call these magnet communities. Buffalo can be one too. Residents can start at a HOPE Inside location, sign up for homeownership, or sign up for a small business program, at no cost to them because partners underwrite it.

How does a family actually build wealth?

Homeownership is the number one way. Black homeownership nationally is about 41 percent, and that gap explains the wealth gap. Buy a modest house you can afford for what you pay in rent. After a few years, borrow a little against the equity, buy another one in a neighborhood next to yours, fix it up, and rent it to someone with a 700 credit score. Do that a few times and you are a millionaire.

My mother is the proof. Juanita raised three children as a single mother and earned $15 an hour for 32 years. When she passed she had an 854 credit score, seven houses, a stock account, a life insurance policy, and a will. She was worth a million dollars. We built an AI agent in her name, so search for Juanita AI and you can talk to her at two in the morning when you get home from work and no coach is available.

Where did this all begin for you?

With a banker who visited my classroom when I was a boy. I asked him what he did, and when I understood that his job was to lend money and get it paid back, I wanted in. I worked at a liquor store in my neighborhood, noticed the owner was selling the wrong candy, found his wholesaler, and borrowed $40 from my mother. I made $300 a week from that investment. It changed how I saw myself. I was homeless at 18, I climbed back, and today Operation HOPE is the largest financial empowerment organization of its kind in America. I’m living proof that this system works for you.

Financial literacy is the civil rights issue of this generation, and so is AI literacy. Learn AI, start something with it, or learn a trade. This country needs about 100,000 new plumbers and electricians every year. Capitalism is not evil. Bad capitalism is evil, and so is greed. When you give a good person a productive system, you get a successful good person.

What happens next in Buffalo?

I want to meet the mayor, the county leaders, the biggest employers, and the community leaders, and I want to build a new movement from the streets to the suites. Dr. King’s coalition took to the streets and made incredible progress. I want a coalition of civic, faith, and business leaders who sit at the table and partner, with financial literacy and AI literacy in schools from kindergarten through college, and HOPE Inside locations as common as Starbucks. If you think I’m wrong, prove it. Raise credit scores 100 points, track the results, and see what follows. I’ll bet you dinner when I get there that the bankers, the chamber, and the millionaires of Buffalo say this is largely on point. See you on the 17th.

Listen: What’s Next? on BTPM NPR
Watch: John Hope Bryant gives lecture in Buffalo, WIVB News 4 Buffalo

John Hope Bryant is the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Operation HOPE, the nation’s largest nonprofit provider of financial literacy and economic empowerment, and the Founder and CEO of Bryant Group Ventures. His latest book is Capitalism for All.