"A preschool in San Francisco. An Aztec restaurant in Oakland. A pest-control outfit in Vallejo. A massage studio in San Jose. These ventures, which seemingly have nothing in common, share a crucial reason for their existence: Women's Initiative for Self Employment, a Bay Area nonprofit marking its 20th anniversary this year.
A microenterprise training and microlending organization, Women's Initiative has helped low-income women start or expand more than 1,600 businesses in Northern California."
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/02/16/MNUFV3EO3.DTL
