As a member of green|spaces for the last few years, I have appreciated the work they do in our community to promote and encourage living sustainably.
If you’re thinking, ‘what does this have to do with personal finance, financial planning, and investing?’, the first thing I would mention would be the excellent collaborative work they have done with their Empower Chattanooga program. They see energy use and affordability of utilities as having a direct impact on the quality of life for many families in our community. What would you do with extra cash from making small tweaks to your home or sustainable activities each month?
Also, we have always offered impact investing options for clients that have expressed an interest - including both a sustainability focus, or a socially responsible investing focus. Our approach to offering impact investing has been reactive in the past. We’ll be more proactive going forward to let clients know that this is an investment choice that is available. This may not be for everyone, but it's a great options to be aware of! Stay tuned – we’ll have a separate post about these options.
In the meantime, we’re announcing our commitment as a business to be more mindful of our day to day decisions and how they influence our social & environmental footprint. We have signed up to become a green|light certified business and will be working on making improvements in the next couple of months.
Bridge Financial Planning has participated in an audit and were happy to learn that we were already doing some of the right things, and humbled to learn of other small changes we can make to have a more positive impact on our environment. We have workplace policies in place that support flexible work schedules, and of course we have a retirement plan! We donate to social causes and organizations that are aligned with the values we have for our community including financial education & empowerment and creating more equitable opportunities for women.
We already use post-consumer paper and local suppliers when possible. Some of our furniture was purchased used. We recycle as much as we can and are committed to making improvements. We will be replacing water bottles for client meetings and will be choosing office cleaning supplies with more friendly options (both for humans and the environment). We’ll be developing an internal policy documenting our commitment and keep us on the lookout for other ways to keep improving.
For the years to come,
Jennifer Harper