Capital for Change, a Wallingford-based community development financial institution, has received a $650,000 grant from a U.S. Department of the Treasury program that supports CDFIs nationwide.

The grant from the Treasury Department’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund is one of 284 financial assistance grants recently awarded nationwide. Totaling $188.7 million, the grants help CDFIs increase lending and investment activity in low-income and economically distressed communities.

“Capital For Change is the only community development financial institution in Connecticut to receive this competitive grant award,” Darcy Arcand, Capital for Change’s development officer, said in a statement. “This development is truly gratifying because it supports our mission to expand opportunity for underserved people and communities within our state.”

The Connecticut grant will support Capital for Change’s growth, reach and performance in expanding economic opportunity through strategic financing that fosters the development of affordable housing, expanded access to energy efficiency, and the financial vitality of nonprofit organizations, president and CEO Calvin Vinal said in a statement.

The mission of Capital for Change, Connecticut’s largest full-service CDFI, is to provide flexible, creative and responsive financial products and services to people with low- and moderate-incomes, minorities and other underserved individuals, businesses and communities.

The nonprofit organization was created in 2016 through the merger of the Community Capital Fund, Connecticut Housing Investment Fund and the Greater New Haven Community Loan Fund, shaping an organization with a statewide history of service since 1968.

Since 1994, the Treasury department has awarded more than $2.4 billion to community development organizations and financial institutions through the Community Development Financial Institutions Program and the Native American CDFI Assistance Program.