Cutbacks in Funds Can Help Charities

To the Editor:

Does a cutback in federal or foundation funding always hurt a charity? This seem to be the assumption of Chronicle writers in discussing programs for troubled girls (“Keeping Girls Out of Trouble,” September 18), but it misses an important issue.

Any charity can go through the motions of serving a target group, but unless its workers and volunteers have an energetic, focused vision about what really helps clients, effort and money can be wasted. This is especially true of programs to help troubled, directionless youngsters.

For the past year, I have volunteered at our local youth activity center, a non-profit we recently founded to give our youngsters constructive alternatives to “hanging out.” A large initial grant enabled us to obtain a building and pay staff salaries.

It turned out, however, that none of us had a firm, self-confident vision of what we wanted to accomplish, and how to accomplish it. So we created a setting where kids would come and watch TV, play Ping-Pong or pool for a few careless minutes, push and shove each other, eat junk food, or stand around being bored. In other words, we had created a hangout which was not doing much good for youngsters — even though it could be made to look appealing in glossy brochures.

Fortunately, lack of funds soon forced us to ask how we needed to change in order to attract enthusiasm and support. We are by no means done with our soul-searching, but we do see that we need more structure and that we need to find ways to motivate youngsters to participate in more challenging activities.

When we reach a program that really shines, people who know about it from the inside — including volunteers like me — will be eager to support it financially. Until then, big outside grants that solve our financial problems would undermine a healthy process of adjustment.

James L. Payne
Lytton Research and Analysis
Sandpoint, Idaho