The current wave of enthusiasm for service and volunteerism in the nonprofit sector — key components of the Obama-Biden campaign platform that are likely to come to pass with the enactment of Serve America Act co-sponsored by Senators Orrin Hatch and Ted Kennedy — risks distorting the American public’s perception of what constitutes good nonprofit jobs, particularly in human services.
Remember the debate in California regarding getting large foundations in that state to report on their grantmaking to racial/ethnic communities and to people of color-led organizations? In several postings (available under the “racial equity” category here), the Cohen Report covered the foundations’ visceral, furious reaction against the legislation that the California state legislature was considering. Before the legislation got to a vote in the California State Senate, in June 10 foundations struck a deal with Assemblyman Joe Coto, the original sponsor of the proposed legislation, to pull the bill in favor of the foundations spending 6 months or so to come up with a voluntary plan for increasing funding and increased capacity-building support for organizations serving minority communities and for POC-led organizations.
In December of 2008, 9 of the 10 foundations released a report describing their 2-3 year plan, titled Strengthening Nonprofit Minority Leadership and the Capacity of Minority-Led and Other Grassroots Community-Based Organizations. Although the foundations’ report includes extensive discussion of the foundations’ current grantmaking reaching communities of color, the following chart lists all of the foundations’ self-categorized “new” commitments, both individual and collaborative, emerging from their 6-month review. (more…)
By the time most people read this, they’ll have seen summaries of the conference report on what the House and Senate conferees finally agreed to. Here’s Part II of what may be in store for nonprofits, based on a reading of the pre-publication draft of the report that will accompany the final bill through the Senate–focusing on issues of tax relief for social safety net purposes:
The spending provisions of the compromise stimulus bill are a bit easier to track and understand than the more arcane tax provisions (see Part II of CR’s review of the conference report on the compromise House/Senate stimulus bill). This review covers some of the provisions with pertinent direct and indirect implications for nonprofits.
To most small, local nonprofits–and nearly all operating 501(c)(3)s are small and local–the concept of “social entrepreneurialism” that they hear touted by their funders implies earning income from business-related activities. But some of the most highly publicized nonprofit social entrepreneurs promoted as models for the nonprofit sector-and frequently mentioned by sector leaders influential with the Obama Administration-demonstrate part of their entrepreneurialism by success at the public trough.
It is clear that the Obama Administration has more interest in and knowledge of the nonprofit sector and its important role in communities than we have seen from a president in a very very long time. What will this mean for your work?
NPQ will help you answer that question by tracking the evolution of nonprofit plans and government actions affecting nonprofits during the first 100 days of the new administration.
Click here to follow our coverage.
And be sure to let us know what you’re seeing aimed at and coming from the Obama Administration.
Details are beginning to emerge as to what the two chambers have done to meld their versions of an economic stimulus package. It’s still a moving target, but here are some of the items that seem to be emerging from the conference committee of relevance to nonprofits, drawn from a document released just moments ago by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office:
During Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, his staff generated a series of specific proposals (contained in Helping All Americans Serve Their Country, aimed at building, supporting, mobilizing the nonprofit sector as an instrument of change and progress consistent with his overall policy platform. This memorandum describes what nonprofit sector organizations have done to generate specific policy recommendations addressing, building on, or challenging the Obama/Biden platform (also contained in part in Blueprint for Change). (more…)
The economic stimulus packages moving through Congress are moving targets. A snapshot from the February 7th Senate deliberations suggests that there might be some interesting discussions between the Senate and House when the two chambers’ stimulus bills come to conference. For nonprofits, here are the headlines and implications:
Why is the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program important in thinking about how quickly economic stimulus outlays might actually reach nonprofits and communities?
Because CDBG is one of the true mainstays of government funding for community-based nonprofits for their core program activities.
