As a community development entity, most of our successes will be project-specific, at the local or regional level. Our initiatives include financing business and affordable housing, developing natural resources like fisheries, forests and farms, creating sustainable communities, developing Maine's workforce and brokering employment opportunities, and creating policies that build on our mission and our 3E approach.

Sustainable development is also a global issue, and we participate in policy and development activities at the international level. CEI Development Services provides consulting services and training to community economic development practitioners and policymakers in the US and abroad. In 2002, CEI President Ron Phillips attended the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa. The event highlighted the disparities between industrialized and developing countries, the correlation between environmental degradation and poverty, and the impacts of economic policies (e.g., agricultural subsidies) on rural developing nations.

At the national level, CEI works with other community development organizations to broaden the practice of 3E investing. In 2003, we took part in a peer learning exchange with Shorebank Enterprise Pacific, in Ilwaco, WA. We shared experiences and the assumptions underlying our approaches to community development, how we measure our impact, and ideas for furthering a 3E perspective with other community developers around the country. The experience was so helpful that we are working to broaden the peer learning exchange concept to other similar organizations throughout the country. In the spirit of sharing, CEI will be updating its introspective case study, Sustainable Development in Practice: A Case Study Analysis of Coastal Enterprises, Inc.'s Experience, in which we examine our theory of community development, our approach to this work, and implications for ourselves and the field.