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Ohio promotes state-religion partnerships to help needy
BY: MARILYN H. KARFELD Senior Staff Reporter
Bellefaire Jewish Children’s Bureau in Shaker Heights will receive $219,000 in taxpayer funds to mentor at-risk teens in foster care.
It is the only Jewish nonprofit to obtain funding this year through the Governor’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (GOFBCI).
Bellefaire was one of 12 nonprofits that together received up to $2.7 million to provide one-on-one mentoring for vulnerable youth, including those who have been homeless or are ex-offenders.
GOFBCI is Ohio’s response to the federal push for government partnerships with religious charities. Both presumptive presidential candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama, have voiced their support for this faith-based funding of social welfare services, also called charitable choice. The concept became law in a little-noticed provision of the 1996 welfare reform legislation.
The faith-based initiative, high on President Bush’s agenda when he first took office, has generated much controversy. Critics say granting public funds to religious groups breaches the constitutional wall dividing church and state. They worry, for example, that a hungry person will feel pressured to pray before he gets a free meal. Or that churches and synagogues will only hire those who share their faith to staff government-funded programs.
Proponents counter that excluding faith-based charities from delivering publicly financed social services discriminates against religion. It ignores the success that churches have had in feeding the poor, aiding the homeless, and assisting former prisoners re-entering the workforce.
GOFBCI, which the Ohio Legislature authorized in 2003, will grant $11 million to community and religious groups for fiscal year 2009. In fiscal year 2008, the office spent about $5.5 million, says Greg Landsman, GOFBCI director. Most of the money comes from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), a federally funded, state-supervised, and county-administered program.
One-stop shopping
Creating strong public-private partnerships to help the needy means more than just distributing money for worthy projects, says Landsman, 31. The Ohio Benefit Bank, a Web-based program his office started, also increases access to assistance. In a visit to one agency, and without traveling to multiple offices and waiting in several lines, a low and moderate-income individual can find out if he’s eligible for food stamps, earned-income tax credit, or other benefits.
“Hundreds of thousands of Ohioans are eligible for energy assistance or food stamps and don’t claim them,” says Landsman. “As a state we leave on the table $1.5 billion of mostly federal money that could be coming to Ohioans every year.”
GOFBCI will provide the Benefit-Bank software to any qualified community nonprofit and will teach staff and volunteers how to use it. There are 680 sites in the state with nearly 3,000 trained counselors who have helped 20,000 people access $23 billion in benefits, Landsman says.
Joyce Garver Keller, lobbyist for Ohio Jewish Communities, a consortium of the state’s Jewish federations, praises GOFBCI since Gov. Ted Strickland came into office and overhauled the charitable choice program. She has sat on the governor’s advisory committee on GOFBCI under both former Gov. Bob Taft and Strickland.
“The new office (under Strickland) is unbelievable,” enthuses Garver Keller. “It’s a jewel and should be a light unto the nations.” Any nonprofit can now quickly search on the GOFBCI website for available federal, state and private grants. Previously, when Jewish federations called her office looking for program funding, Garver Keller had to randomly contact numerous granting agencies, often turning up empty-handed.
Before the Benefit Bank, a person “would have to go to 16 agencies to find out she wasn’t eligible (for a program) or she didn’t bring the right documents,” Garver Keller says.
Charitable choice works
Funding to community and religious groups works because these organizations, often churches, are close to where people live, work and play, notes Landsman. This proximity “makes a big difference” in encouraging more Ohioans to get the supports they are eligible for, which “helps them move from struggling financially and poverty to a level of self-sufficiency.”
The office is working to serve more people by recruiting community and religious charities to provide mentors, adoptive homes and additional summer food sites, Landsman said. A new initiative with the state treasurer’s office seeks nonprofits to offer financial literacy programs for the needy.
Landsman, who is Jewish, earned a master’s degree in theological studies from the Harvard Divinity School. There, he studied how government and faith-based organizations create meaningful public-private partnerships. There is no proselytizing in Ohio’s charitable-choice program and “by and large” that has been the case in other states, he insists.
“The Constitution is king. Your programs have to be devoid of inherently religious activities. In the basement of a synagogue, that’s fine. There can be religious symbols on the wall. But you can’t do anything religious during the time when public dollars are at play.” His office monitors grantees, including through site visits, to make sure they follow the rules.
While charities must serve everyone, no matter his or her religion, national origin or race, Landsman admits “there is some debate on whether or not charitable choice allows (nonprofits) to have preferential rights” regarding the religion of those they hire. We have never encountered a situation where that has become an issue.”
Concerns about corruption, political influence
Critics of charitable choice also worry about public corruption and partisan politics influencing who gets state contracts. Under former Gov. Bob Taft, GOFBCI was criticized for awarding a $2.1 million contract to a politically well-connected, Virginia-based organization called We Care America, reports Claire Hughes of The Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy Reform in a 2007 report. The Roundtable at The State University of New York looks at government partnerships with religious charities.
We Care America, which filed for bankruptcy and is now defunct, was founded by Don Donaldson, former national director of televangelist Pat Robertson’s relief organization, Operation Blessing, and an honorary member of Bush’s Presidential Prayer Team.
Ohio’s inspector general found that We Care owes the state at least $125,000 for overpayments, among other things. He also recommended further review of $485,000 in questionable state payments to We Care.
Thus far, there hasn’t been much interest among Jewish charities in applying for faith-based grants, notes Garver Keller, in part because most Jewish agencies don’t deal with many people eligible for TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families).
However, she recently advised the Cincinnati Jewish Community Federation, which has a youth offender re-entry program and mentors at-risk children through its Jewish Big Brothers/Big Sisters program, to consider applying for GOFBCI grants.
Faith-based funding has gotten a bad name, she maintains. “It’s not giving money to evangelical Christians to proselytize.”
mkarfeld@cjn.org
“The Constitution is king. Programs have to be devoid of religious activities.”
Greg Landsman, director, Ohio GOFBCI
BOX
2008-09 Ohio Faith-based and Community Grants added these programs:
Mentoring vulnerable youth.
Bellefaire received $219,000 to provide one-on-one mentors for 15 at- risk teens in foster care, says Brett Katz, director of development.
Summer food and learning program for 500,000 children eligible for free and reduced-price lunches during the school year.
Re-entry programs for former prisoners.
Workshops and counseling to promote healthy marriages.
Initiatives to strengthen relationships between African-American fathers and their children.
It is the only Jewish nonprofit to obtain funding this year through the Governor’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (GOFBCI).
Bellefaire was one of 12 nonprofits that together received up to $2.7 million to provide one-on-one mentoring for vulnerable youth, including those who have been homeless or are ex-offenders.
GOFBCI is Ohio’s response to the federal push for government partnerships with religious charities. Both presumptive presidential candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama, have voiced their support for this faith-based funding of social welfare services, also called charitable choice. The concept became law in a little-noticed provision of the 1996 welfare reform legislation.
The faith-based initiative, high on President Bush’s agenda when he first took office, has generated much controversy. Critics say granting public funds to religious groups breaches the constitutional wall dividing church and state. They worry, for example, that a hungry person will feel pressured to pray before he gets a free meal. Or that churches and synagogues will only hire those who share their faith to staff government-funded programs.
Proponents counter that excluding faith-based charities from delivering publicly financed social services discriminates against religion. It ignores the success that churches have had in feeding the poor, aiding the homeless, and assisting former prisoners re-entering the workforce.
GOFBCI, which the Ohio Legislature authorized in 2003, will grant $11 million to community and religious groups for fiscal year 2009. In fiscal year 2008, the office spent about $5.5 million, says Greg Landsman, GOFBCI director. Most of the money comes from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), a federally funded, state-supervised, and county-administered program.
One-stop shopping
Creating strong public-private partnerships to help the needy means more than just distributing money for worthy projects, says Landsman, 31. The Ohio Benefit Bank, a Web-based program his office started, also increases access to assistance. In a visit to one agency, and without traveling to multiple offices and waiting in several lines, a low and moderate-income individual can find out if he’s eligible for food stamps, earned-income tax credit, or other benefits.
“Hundreds of thousands of Ohioans are eligible for energy assistance or food stamps and don’t claim them,” says Landsman. “As a state we leave on the table $1.5 billion of mostly federal money that could be coming to Ohioans every year.”
GOFBCI will provide the Benefit-Bank software to any qualified community nonprofit and will teach staff and volunteers how to use it. There are 680 sites in the state with nearly 3,000 trained counselors who have helped 20,000 people access $23 billion in benefits, Landsman says.
Joyce Garver Keller, lobbyist for Ohio Jewish Communities, a consortium of the state’s Jewish federations, praises GOFBCI since Gov. Ted Strickland came into office and overhauled the charitable choice program. She has sat on the governor’s advisory committee on GOFBCI under both former Gov. Bob Taft and Strickland.
“The new office (under Strickland) is unbelievable,” enthuses Garver Keller. “It’s a jewel and should be a light unto the nations.” Any nonprofit can now quickly search on the GOFBCI website for available federal, state and private grants. Previously, when Jewish federations called her office looking for program funding, Garver Keller had to randomly contact numerous granting agencies, often turning up empty-handed.
Before the Benefit Bank, a person “would have to go to 16 agencies to find out she wasn’t eligible (for a program) or she didn’t bring the right documents,” Garver Keller says.
Charitable choice works
Funding to community and religious groups works because these organizations, often churches, are close to where people live, work and play, notes Landsman. This proximity “makes a big difference” in encouraging more Ohioans to get the supports they are eligible for, which “helps them move from struggling financially and poverty to a level of self-sufficiency.”
The office is working to serve more people by recruiting community and religious charities to provide mentors, adoptive homes and additional summer food sites, Landsman said. A new initiative with the state treasurer’s office seeks nonprofits to offer financial literacy programs for the needy.
Landsman, who is Jewish, earned a master’s degree in theological studies from the Harvard Divinity School. There, he studied how government and faith-based organizations create meaningful public-private partnerships. There is no proselytizing in Ohio’s charitable-choice program and “by and large” that has been the case in other states, he insists.
“The Constitution is king. Your programs have to be devoid of inherently religious activities. In the basement of a synagogue, that’s fine. There can be religious symbols on the wall. But you can’t do anything religious during the time when public dollars are at play.” His office monitors grantees, including through site visits, to make sure they follow the rules.
While charities must serve everyone, no matter his or her religion, national origin or race, Landsman admits “there is some debate on whether or not charitable choice allows (nonprofits) to have preferential rights” regarding the religion of those they hire. We have never encountered a situation where that has become an issue.”
Concerns about corruption, political influence
Critics of charitable choice also worry about public corruption and partisan politics influencing who gets state contracts. Under former Gov. Bob Taft, GOFBCI was criticized for awarding a $2.1 million contract to a politically well-connected, Virginia-based organization called We Care America, reports Claire Hughes of The Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy Reform in a 2007 report. The Roundtable at The State University of New York looks at government partnerships with religious charities.
We Care America, which filed for bankruptcy and is now defunct, was founded by Don Donaldson, former national director of televangelist Pat Robertson’s relief organization, Operation Blessing, and an honorary member of Bush’s Presidential Prayer Team.
Ohio’s inspector general found that We Care owes the state at least $125,000 for overpayments, among other things. He also recommended further review of $485,000 in questionable state payments to We Care.
Thus far, there hasn’t been much interest among Jewish charities in applying for faith-based grants, notes Garver Keller, in part because most Jewish agencies don’t deal with many people eligible for TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families).
However, she recently advised the Cincinnati Jewish Community Federation, which has a youth offender re-entry program and mentors at-risk children through its Jewish Big Brothers/Big Sisters program, to consider applying for GOFBCI grants.
Faith-based funding has gotten a bad name, she maintains. “It’s not giving money to evangelical Christians to proselytize.”
mkarfeld@cjn.org
“The Constitution is king. Programs have to be devoid of religious activities.”
Greg Landsman, director, Ohio GOFBCI
BOX
2008-09 Ohio Faith-based and Community Grants added these programs:
Mentoring vulnerable youth.
Bellefaire received $219,000 to provide one-on-one mentors for 15 at- risk teens in foster care, says Brett Katz, director of development.
Summer food and learning program for 500,000 children eligible for free and reduced-price lunches during the school year.
Re-entry programs for former prisoners.
Workshops and counseling to promote healthy marriages.
Initiatives to strengthen relationships between African-American fathers and their children.
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