Something to set the mood…

EDUCATION
- Rhee Targets Teachers’ Seniority, Tenure Rules (WaPo, 7/3) - “Those who voluntarily [give up seniority and tenure rights] would receive thousands of dollars in bonuses and raises, funded with foundation grants…” Expert: “If Rhee accomplishes this, it would be earthshaking reform that would have implications everywhere.”
* WG EVENT: A Conversation with Michelle Rhee - July 17

- Lack of Funds Cited For Halting Renovations of DC schools (WaPo, 7/3)

HIV/AIDS
DC HIV/AIDS Administration Out of Condoms (FightHIVinDC.org, 7/1) - Apparently it’s temporary, but still.

FORECLOSURE CRISIS
Housing Counselors Struggle Keep Up with Demand of Desperate Clients (WAMU, 7/2) - “Local non-profits are struggling to meet the needs of desperate clients facing home foreclosure.” Chuck Bean: “We hear that emergency systems funds are being used up faster than in previous years, while the waitlists for help are growing.”

PHILANTHROPY
Economy Slows, Wealthy Giving Grows (Forbes, 7/3) - “Individuals made 267 gifts of more than a million dollars during the first quarter, up 43% from 186 the previous year.”

COMMUNITIES
Study: N.Va. hub for immigrants (Examiner, 7/3)

SOCIAL PROFIT SECTOR
- Social profits “are continuing to drive employment growth in Maryland, a new report suggests.” (BalSun, 7/1)
- Charity Goes Green (Chronicle, 6/26) - Discussion: How charities can go green
- Invest in the best to make an impact (FT, 6/28) - on the need to encourage social profits to take risks.

EDUCATION
- Looking at the Dropout Issue (WaPo, 6/30) - a new report from the KIPP Foundation on student mobility
- School Officials Urge Approval Of Funds for Building Repairs (WaPo, 7/1)

ARTS
Arts Patrons, the Next Generation (NYTimes, 6/29)

CORPORATE
GE Foundation gives $18M to NYC school system (Fortune, 7/1 | NYTimes, 6/30)

HEALTH
- HIV-AIDS continues to ensnare young gay men (WaPo editorial, 6/30)
- Decline in Teen Smoking Hits a Wall (WaPo, 6/29)

HOUSING
- Fairfax will buy foreclosed properties to use as affordable housing (WaPo, 7/1)
- Jumping payments on subrime loans raises foreclosure projections (WaPo, 7/1)

——————————
@WG:
- Sustainable Communities Working Group - July 10
- Summer Film Series: Part I - July 10
- Webinar: How Funders Can Choose to Manage Advocacy Campaigns - July 15
- Nonprofit Mergers: The Funders’ Role (part of the *Nosh, Network & Knowledge* corporate luncheon series) - July 17
- Public Education Working Group Update from Michelle Rhee - July 17
- Health Working Group Retreat - July 21

Join Washington Grantmakers’ Public Education Working Group in a conversation with DC Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee and Chief of Transformation Management, Abigail Smith, about the current thinking on the school Transformation Plan and potential areas for local philanthropic investments. WG members: Please click here to register.

Date: July 17th, 2008
Time: 2:00pm-4:00pm
Location: World Bank, Washington, DC
Room location details to follow.

EDUCATION
- Grants Will Aid Groups Working for Education Reform (WaPo, 6/27 | press release) - Led by the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region, the Collaborative for Education Organizing (CEO) ”will award $725,000 in grants today to fund five District nonprofit organizations dedicated to the city’s public education restructuring.” WG’s Public Education Working Group has partnered with The Community Foundation to support the launch and on-going work of the Collaborative, with several members investing in the effort.
> Grant recipients: The Asian Pacific American Legal Resource Center; the D.C. Alliance of Youth Advocates; Youth Education Alliance; D.C. Voice; Tellin’ Stories.

- County schools get grants to boost performance (Gazette, 6/19) - national funding for Pr. George’s County Public Schools from Dell and Broad Foundations.
- Tranportation rule change could leave D.C. schoolchildren behind (WaPo, 6/27)

PHILANTHROPY
California Foundations Back Compromise to Defeat Diversity-Disclosure Measure (Chronicle, 6/24)

HEALTH
$90 Million Urged to Expand Health Care - “Rand Report Calls for Focus on Residents East of the Anacostia” (WaPo, 6/27)

PROGRAMS
- National Children’s Museum to partner with the Accokeek Foundation on educational programs for kids. (Gazette, 6/26)
- Profile: Marriott Foundation for People with Disabilities’ Bridges school-to-work program (WaPo, 6/26)

$4 per GALLON
IRS raises mileage deductible rate 8 cents (Balitmore Sun, 6/24)

AGING
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Supports New Elder-Care Effort (WSJ, via the Chronicle, 6/24) - “effort to replace large nursing homes with small, homelike facilities for 10 to 12 elderly residents”
> Related: WG’s FunderView (June 2008) - The Agua Fund’s Bonita Tindley talks about funding for elderly-care issues

PHILANTHROPY/NONPROFITS
- Washington Area Women’s Foundation Awards $645,500 in New Grants (6/23)
- Nonprofits struggle to keep up with needs (WBJ, 6/20) - Op-ed by the Women Foundation’s Phyllis Caldwell

HOUSING
D.C. Plans To Inspect All Rental Housing - will proactively inspect all buildings as part of crackdown on slumlords (WaPo, 6/25)

HEALTH
- District Sues CareFirst, Says Provider Must Donate Millions (WaPo, 6/25)
CareFirst’s D.C. operation is a federally chartered not-for-profit that must be run as a “charitable and benevolent institution.” But what exactly does “charitable and benevolent” mean? And there’s the problem.
- Doctors Balk at Electronic Records (WaPo, 6/24)

EDUCATION
- Teacher Bonuses Get Unions’ Blessing in Pr. George’s County (WaPo, 6/25)
- Report: Area math, reading scores spike (Examiner, 6/25)

by Mardell Moffett (Cafritz Foundation), Chair

Here are a few major items to report as we move into the summer months:

• After 3 years, Karen FitzGerald is stepping down as chair of the Sustainable Communities Working Group. Under her leadership, SCWG has enjoyed numerous successes, including fostering the development of the Washington Regional Equity Network; and planning, developing, and launching the Partnership for Prince George’s County. Without her bold advocacy at the Meyer Foundation – which included securing $150,000 for its development – the Partnership would not have enjoyed as successful a launch as it had in January. On behalf of Washington Grantmakers, I thank Karen for her dedication, leadership, and hard work.
• Plans are being finalized to launch an office greening competition in September. “Grantmakers Go Green” will challenge all WG members to undertake various environmentally-conscious efforts around the office and measure their outcomes. A planning committee has been hard at work for the past several months mapping out the expectations and details of the competition. Our overarching goal is to educate and motivate WG members around green practices so that they, in turn, can spread their knowledge and habits to their grantees. Details of the competition will be announced soon, and we are very excited about it. Please let us know if you are interested in joining in on the planning!
• On June 16, SCWG, Prince Charitable Trusts, and the Cafritz Foundation hosted a briefing about GreenSPACE – a new state-of-the-art resource center for green building in the metropolitan area. The District’s Green Building Act has sweeping implications for funders and grantees, and both Maryland and Virginia are working towards similar legislation. GreenSPACE will serve as a valuable point of coordination for funders, nonprofits, business leaders, and government officials. We will keep the Working Group informed as the project progresses.
• Finally, we will be bringing the Working Group back together for a Summer Quarterly meeting on July 10th, from 10:00am-noon. At the meeting, we will update each other on activities. You can register here.

We look forward to seeing you soon. If you have any questions about the Working Group, please contact Carolynn Mambu at mambu@washingtongrantmakers.org.

Best,

Mardell Moffett
Chair, Sustainable Communities Working Group

HEALTH
Comprehensive dental care for D.C. homeless (wire, 6/24) - Unity Health Care will open a center at the Federal City Homeless Assistance Center with a grant from WG member CareFirst.

PHILANTHROPY
Rockefeller 2.0: Gates relaunches philanthropy (MSNBC, 6/23) - As Bill Gates leaves Microsoft to go full-time at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (WG member), philanthropy gets a lot of ink. Rick Cohen: “One out of every 10 foundation dollars spent is going to have the Gates name on it” … “an influence that is impossible to calculate.”

FAMILY INCOME
Capital Area Asset Builders celebrates low-income D.C. participants’ savings in 2007 (6/23) - Supporters include WG members Washington Area Women’s Foundation and The Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation.

DEVELOPMENT
Green Alliance Takes a Stand at Poplar Point (WaPo, 6/24)

HOUSEKEEPING
- WG Daily won’t be daily from Thursday through Tuesday due to staff travel.
- Nonprofits, foundations, corporate givers–we’re always interested in your press releases and news. Send to grantmakers@gmail.com.
- Email subscribers–the daily news is usually online a couple of hours before it hits your inbox. For the early scoop, visit WashingtonGrantmakers.org.

…and straight from the actual AP wire (via DCeiver) comes the headline: “Everything seemingly is spinning out of control.” (So don’t worry, it’s not just you.) -Nick

Post and find jobs here. (WG members post for free–see “30-second Update” page for the code.)

• Program Officer - Samberg Family Foundation (Arlington, Virginia)
• Operations Assistant - Arabella Philanthropic Investment Advisors (District of Columbia)
• Marketing and Event Manager - Fight For Children, Inc. (District of Columbia)

Despite Economic Dip, Giving Rose in 2007 (WaPo, 6/23) Giving USA survey says: Charitable giving up 1 percent … private foundations, up 7 percent … corporate, down 1 percent … personal bequests, up 4 percent. But even a slight decline next  year could severely hurt nonprofits that are ”chronically undercapitalized anyway,” says the Meyer Foundation’s Julie Rogers. “They may be very well managed, but they live at the financial margins because most of them don’t have much by way of financial reserves or working capital, and they are raising every dollar every year.”
> Increase in Charitable Giving Dampened by Signs of Belt-Tightening (NYTimes, 6/23)

Fenty Consolidates Control Over Youth Nonprofit - ”Millicent Williams, who had been head of Serve DC, the mayoral volunteerism concern, will be the new executive director of the Children and Youth Investment Trust Corp.” (CityPaper, 6/20)

“Britain’s most generous philanthropists” (Guardian, 6/22) “a new kind of philanthropy that includes forging links with governments that have converted projects into national policies.” (Telegraph, 6/22)

DEVELOPMENT
Seeking to prevent development at Poplar Point, the Earth Conversation Corps is “90 percent of the way sure” that they’re going to sue D.C. for failing to clean up toxic waste there. (WBJ, 6/20) This has led several to note that while parks are important, so is dense, mixed-use development.

ENVIRONMENT
“A local nonprofit aims to unveil the first nationally standardized green scorecard for buildings” (WBJ, 6/20)

_____________________________
@WG:
Public Education Working Group - June 25
Children, Youth, and Families Working Group - DYRS Update - July 1
Sustainable Communities Working Group - July 10
Summer Film Series: Part I - July 10