Winchester City Council is actively seeking projects and opportunities around Community Municipal Investments [CMI].
A CMI is a bond or loan mechanism issued by a council directly to the public, and can be used to supplement, diversify or replace sources of borrowing to fund specific infrastructure projects, or to refinance existing debt.
Winchester has already acknowledged CMI as a funding option in its 2023/24 treasury management and investment strategies, and has now begun the process of identifying carbon saving and high nature projects suited to CMI investment “in conjunction with appropriate stakeholders”.
A resolution to continue to develop CMI for Winchester and identify projects was made at a recent Council meeting as part of the authority’s strategy to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2030 and “do all it can to protect and enhance nature”.
Once a suitable project is identified, the council committed to “scope methods to promote CMI as a way residents and institutions can contribute to a new zero carbon and high nature Winchester district”.
The authority sees CMI as offering a “very different set of financial benefits to investors when compared with investments offered by commercial companies”, noting that the source of finance is “a way to channel local savings into local projects”.
CMIs could also help the council develop a “low carbon Winchester District in partnership with our community”.
The council added that CMIs provide “multiple engagement and social value benefits as a powerful and complementary community engagement tool”.
Winchester said it could learn from “other pioneers of CMI” in developing “appropriate local opportunities for local investors”.
West Berkshire Council launched the UK’s first CMI in Summer 2020, and has partnered with the Green Finance Institute (GFI).
The GFI recently published its Local Climate Bonds (LCB) Toolkit to help local authorities unlock £3bn of green investment opportunities.
LCBs are a type of CMI, and enable local authorities to raise capital to fund decarbonisation projects in their communities such as wind farms, solar panels and rewilding. LCBs are open to all investors from £5 via a crowdfunding platform hosted by Abundance Investment.
Research by Abundance and the University of Leeds has calculated that LCBs could raise £3bn if issued by all 343 councils in England.
The GFI Toolkit, which provides local authorities with a source of information on the bonds, features the case study of Westminster City Council, which was the fastest authority to raise an LCB. The issuance raised £1m of private finance in nine days from 485 investors.
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