Fund Board Approves Grants, New Procedures
Episcopal News Service. December 3, 1981 [81312]
GREENWICH, Conn. -- The Board of the Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop's Fund for World Relief, meeting in mid-November at Seabury House here, authorized new grants totaling $429,210; unanimously approved a new procedure authorizing direct financial support in 1982 from the Bureau for Refugee Programs of the Department of State for the reception and placement of refugees by parishes; and heard a report on the Fund's leadership role in the work of national voluntary agencies from the Rev. Samir J. Habiby, the Fund's director.
A schedule of receipts and disbursements of $2,750,000 anticipating a continuing increase in undesignated voluntary giving to the Fund, was adopted, and included an allocation of $846,000 in support of the ecumenical and.cooperative national agencies.
The new 16 mm color refugee film Hope for New Life -- a companion film to Yes, a Difference -- was previewed and received at the House of Bishops meeting in October in San Diego and has been well received. The production costs were covered by the Rochester Gift made to the Fund in 1976. Prints of this film, with a brief study guide, will soon be sent to every diocese.
The new arrangement with the Bureau for Refugee Programs will make possible the use of $1,431,000 in federal monies in 1982 if the Fund succeeds in its plan for placing 3,000 refugees in this period. Most of this financial support will be administered through dioceses, which can now have a much more active role in this ministry, with a number of viable options in their own areas, including (if they so choose) a relationship with the Church World Service's ecumenically funded centers.
Noting that this new contractual procedure has been under careful study for nearly a year, Harry Havemeyer of New York, chairman of the Fund Board's Refugee/ Migration Committee, admitted to the "challenge ahead," but said that "it is a positive step to take" and will make the Church's refugee services "more effective."
Hitherto, these services were contracted through Church World Service's Immigration and Refugee Program. It was emphasized by Richard Wheeler, Citibank executive who chairs the board's executive committee, that the Episcopal Church, through the work of the Fund, continues as a full member of Church World Service and will support its other diverse ministries, both abroad and in the United States. The board approved $71,000 in support of the Immigration and Refugee Program Committee of that organization in 1982.
One principal advantage of the new funding arrangement is that dioceses will be more directly involved and that sponsoring parishes will have better advance information about refugee families. The Fund's refugee-related staff at the Church Center and in the field will be able to provide required interim services with less delay.
Before considering immediate grant requests, ,-he board formally endorsed nine emergency grants made since September 24. These grants, which have previously been announced, totaled $59,500 and brought to $239,440 the amount committed to date in 1981 for emergency grants.
Bishop Matthew Bigliardi of the Diocese of Oregon, who chairs the grants committee, reported that 38 requests totaling $1,250,000 for rehabilitation and short-term development grants had been considered. However, a number did not qualify within the Fund's criteria, and others were deferred. The limitations of funds available in this period of granting allowed for funding of programs of high priority only.
The following rehabilitation and development grants were approved:
- For support to an ecumenical task force dealing with the continuing problems of persons living in the Love Canal section of Niagara Falls; requested by the Diocese of Western New York: $6,000;
- For a residential facility for abused or neglected children in Louisiana; requested by the Diocese of Western Louisiana: $5,000;
- For assistance in the construction of hurricane-resistant housing in the Dominican Republic; requested by the Diocese of the Dominican Republic: $10,000 with additional funding planned during 1982 if funds are available;
- For a statewide campaign to help eliminate hunger among low and moderate income citizens of North Carolina; requested by the Diocese of North Carolina: $10,000;
- For a production/processing/distribution food-service system in Hartford, Conn.; requested by the Diocese of Connecticut and endorsed by the Ecumenical Review Board: $8,000;
- For a self-sufficient food production, transportation, marketing, distribution system locally controlled through cooperatives; requested by the Diocese of North Carolina: $20,000;
- For a comprehensive grassroots-based coalition in Colorado which supports coordinated programs of food production, land use, conservation and energy policy in the fight against hunger; requested by the Diocese of Colorado: $9,000;
- For partial staff support of Women's Work World in rural Virginia to facilitate working opportunities for women; sponsored by Appalachian People's Service Organization and requested through the Diocese of Southwestern Virginia: $2,000;
- For one year funding of the Chrysalis Program in Indiana, a study of the Church's role in interpreting the root causes of hunger; requested by -:he Diocese of Indianapolis: $7,000;
- For support of the Houston Interfaith Hunger Coalition, sponsored by the Houston Metro Ministries; endorsed by the Ecumenical Review Board; requested by the Diocese of Texas: $9,000;
- For further support of the small farm management assistance program in Massachusetts; requested by the Diocese of Western Massachusetts: $10,000;
- For staff support of a downtown community kitchen in Durham, N.C., which provides food, shelter and counseling to the poor; requested by the Diocese of North Carolina: $8,000;
- For support of vegetable, animal and aquaculture production planning in Maine; requested by the Diocese of Maine: $5,000;
- For the cost of training Christian volunteers to serve in rural Kenya in community health and home economic projects; requested by the Province of Kenya: $20,000;
- For aid to the Georgia Agricultural Marketing Project, to strengthen small farm economy; requested by the Diocese of Atlanta: $14,000;
- For support to the Feed Food Bank of Ohio, which collects and distributes food to the needy; requested by the Diocese of Ohio: $7,000.
Also approved was a grant to the three Episcopal dioceses in the Philippines of up to $60,000 for initial operating and equipment costs of the new development program for the first year. A second year's funding in the amount of $50,000 was approved, subject to evaluation. A grant of $28,000 was also approved, as an advance (expected to be repaid), for the federal grant solicitation staff work in the World Mission Development Office. These monies are allocated from the Venture in Mission gift made to the Fund from the Diocese of Southwest Florida.
The Refugee/Migration Affairs Committee submitted the following grant requests for use during the balance of 1981, totaling $60,000 in Church-donated funds (CF) and $131,218 in Bureau for Refugee Programs government-derived funding (BRP) presently received through Church World Service's Immigration and Refugee Program:
- Support to the Episcopal Convocation of American Churches in Europe for the emergency care and counseling for refugees (largely students) marooned in Rome by the refugee crisis; an emergency grant of $2,000 previously authorized: $13,000 (CF);
- To provide housing, sustenance, education and counseling for children orphaned in El Salvador by civil strife; supplementing an earlier emergency grant of $10,000: $16,000 (CF);
- For a ministry to displaced persons now resettled in Kenya; requested by the Province of Kenya: $15,000 (CF);
- For a hostel at the Mission House of the Parish of St. Mary the Virgin in New York City for Indochinese refugees and others; requested by the Diocese of New York: $4,000 (CF); and $16,000 (BRP);
- For a joint ministry by the Dioceses of Dallas and Louisiana to provide immediate resettlement support services and job development for Haitian refugees: $30,000 (BRP);
- For services to refugees, especially Haitians, who seek sponsors, housing and employment in New York City; requested by the Diocese of New York: $31,800 (BRP);
- For the Haitian Resource Center in New York City, so that the Diocese of New York and the United Haitian Association can offer further professional and language services: $15,000 (BRP);
- For partial staff funding of the Maryland Refugee Committee which is promoting and coordinating refugee resettlement; requested by the Diocese of Maryland: $10,418 (BRP);
- For continued coordinated regional refugee work by the Diocese of Dallas: $20,500 (BRP);
- For renovation and additional housing space at the refugee center in Brooklyn; requested by the Diocese of Long Island: $12,000 (CF);
- For additional funding for refugee resettlement work in the Diocese of Long Island, supplementing a grant of $20,000 made in early 1981 by the Fund: $8,500 (BRP).
The board also endorsed the continuation of the Fund's network officer and provided adequate support funds. Harriet and John Goodbody, John's Island, S.C., Volunteers for Mission who have staffed this position since it was initiated on June 1, 1980, end their tenure December 31, 1981. Miss M. Jacqueline Brandt continues as the support anchor person at the Church Center.
It was announced that the Presiding Bishop's Christmas/Epiphany Appeal for 1981-82 will again ask for funds to combat famine and hunger in East Africa.
The board honored three retiring members: Miss Kristen Connor of the Diocese of New York; the Rev. Canon Eugene Jennings of the Diocese of West Texas; and the Rev. James Ottley of Panama. They welcomed two new members appointed by Presiding Bishop John M. Allin: Leonard Coleman, Jr., a former lay missionary in Kenya and presently executive director of the Greater Newark (NJ) Urban Coalition; and Mrs. Thomas Hutchinson of Dallas, who was elected to the Executive Council in 1979.