Fund Gifts Up, Board Is Told
Episcopal News Service. March 5, 1981 [81077]
GREENWICH, Conn. -- The Board of the Presiding Bishop's Fund for World Relief, meeting in late February at Seabury House here, authorized a new film on its ministry with refugees, supported continuing plans for funding long-range development projects fighting hunger, approved the disbursement of $330,000 in new grants, and had an encouraging word from the director, the Rev. Samir J. Habiby, that contributions to the Fund in 1980 were $2,372,000 -- a new high mark in voluntary giving from the Church constituency. This does not include the generous $1 million gift from the Diocese of Southwest Florida for Global Hunger Concerns, nor the nearly $1 million received in support of the Refugee/Migration programs from Church World Service government contracts-derived funds.
Habiby, on the third anniversary of his appointment as director, reviewed the broadening ministry of the Fund during his administration, the emerging leadership of the Fund in policy-making in private and public sectors in the United States and abroad, and the close relationships now developed and maintained both with ecumenical agencies and with the Church Center staff and Episcopal dioceses and networks.
Cooperation and coordination with the hunger network has been a high priority. Early planning is underway for various ways to relate the hunger network and the Fund at the 1982 General Convention in New Orleans. Habiby also noted that programs and strong support from the Church-wide Hunger Task Force continue to be a major source and stimulant for dollar contributions to the Fund. Dr. David Crean, hunger officer for the Church Center, consults in appropriate grant proposals to the Fund and sits with each board meeting. Dwight Wait, of Greenwich, has agreed to serve as the Fund's board member in liaison with the hunger network.
Richard W. Wheeler, chairman of the board's executive committee, chaired the meeting and introduced three new members recently appointed by Presiding Bishop John M. Allin: Mortimer H. Chute, Jr., of New York, vice president for program and planning of the Committee for UNICEF; Janice M. Duncan of Philadelphia, and the Rt. Rev. Luc Anatole Jacques Garnier, Bishop of Haiti. A fourth new member, the Rt. Rev. Calvin O. Schofield, Bishop of Southeast Florida, was unable to attend. Wheeler also welcomed Nancy L. Marvell, the newly appointed assistant for administration. Marvell had served in the Presiding Bishop's office for four years and joined the Fund's staff on Feb. 1.
The new refugee film, to be funded by the Rochester gift, will complement Yes, A Difference and will also be produced by Alva Cox, Jr., of Synesthetics, Inc. of Cos Cob, Conn. It will document the theological base of the Church's ministry to world migrants and refugees in many other countries and clarify the role of parishes in resettling refugees. The staff of the Fund and the communication office will give appropriate direction to Cox during production, and completion is expected by early fall.
An interim report on long-range overseas development programs to combat global hunger was made by Dr. Edward A. Holmes, World Mission project planning officer. Some $200,000 from the $1 million Venture in Mission pledge to the Presiding Bishop's Fund from the Diocese of Southwest Florida is already available for the work, with a total of $3 million anticipated during the coming months from funds channeled through diocesan Venture designations.
Holmes, former dean of academic affairs at Cuttington College in Liberia and later administrator of a large AID-supported agricultural project there, emphasized that each project was initiated by Episcopal or Anglican bishops overseas and would be carried out collaboratively with their leadership and oversight. In each case, matching funds are sought from private or governmental sources.
The grants committee, chaired by Bishop Matthew Bigliardi of Oregon, considered 14 grant requests and the board approved the following:
- Idaho Hunger Action Council: $7,000 for a state-wide organization which will establish five local programs for gleaning -- a process for recovering produce from the fields after machinery and professional pickers have completed their work;
- Antioquia, Colombia: $10,000 to support a cooperative agricultural and fishery project;
- Diocese of Maine: $20,000 toward the replacement of a mobile unit for health care delivery for rural poor children; a matching grant is required before funding;
- Diocese of Newark: $5,000 to assist in establishing a store-front cooperative with a grocery delivery service for the elderly, handicapped, shut-ins and poor;
- Diocese of Panama: $20,000 for an agricultural and cattle cooperative at El limite;
- Diocese of Washington: $9,500 of a projected $152,000 budget to increase food supplies to needy persons in the Washington area;
- Dominica and St. Vincent/Windward Islands: $20,000 to support a training program to improve nutrition and food processing sponsored by Meals for Millions;
- St. Louis/Food Crisis Network: $10,000 to improve the collection, processing and distribution of food for the needy.
The refugee/migration committee, chaired by Harry Havemeyer of New York, presented grant requests for board approval. In some cases, funds are being provided or supplemented through Church World Service's derived federal grants, indicated by the designation (CWS/F). Grants which were approved are:
- Diocese of New York: $3,000 to develop materials "to bridge the gap between proselytizing and ignoring the spiritual needs of newly-arrived Chinese-speaking refugees;" these materials, after testing, will be a basis for the development of similar resources for other ethnic groups;
- Diocese of New York: $20,000 (CWS/F) for an innovative program to allow Indo-Chinese refugees to become self-supporting at the earliest practicable time;
- Diocese of New York: $3,000 (CWS/F) to produce printed materials to aid Chinese refugees to adjust more quickly into the community;
- Diocese of New York: $4,000 to enable the Chinatown Mission of the Church in New York City to work with Maryknoll Sisters in helping Chinese refugees speak English;
- Scholarship Funds: $27,143 for a two-phase program to provide funds administered through the World Mission Scholarship Office for refugee students, principally from Africa, and to support this program for the next 18 months;
- Diocese of Los Angeles: $3,000 to supplement funds for counseling and job placement services to Cuban refugees;
- Dioceses of Dallas and Louisiana: $12,833 plus $8,000 (CWS/F) to "open up the major cities of the South and Southwest to settlement for Haitian refugees;" the Rev. Paddy J. Poux, Haitian-born priest of the Diocese of Louisiana, will assist in directing this work;
- Diocese of Los Angeles: $10,000 (CWS/F) to assist in developing a regional refugee office to facilitate parish sponsorship of refugees;
- Diocese of Los Angeles: $10,000 plus $10,000 (CWS/F) to provide a temporary facility for sheltering and ministering to Cuban refugees in the Orange County area;
- Diocese of Long Island: $13,850 (CWS/F) to enable the continuance of the Rumanian Refugee Resettlement Program in Ridgewood, N. Y.;
- Refugee/Migration Film Project: $88,450 from the Rochester gift for the new refugee film to be produced by Al Cox of Synesthetics, Inc.; included is the cost of 100 prints and three Spanish-language prints.
The administration and finance committee, chaired by the Rev. Canon C. Eugene Jennings of West Texas, recommended that 10 percent of the general undesignated funds be reserved each quarter to provide flexibility in making emergency grants. This was approved. Guidelines were also amended to allow the director to authorize emergency grants up to $5,000 rather than an earlier limit of $3,000. The Presiding Bishop has authority up to $10,000, as does the Executive for World Mission, the Rev. Samuel Van Culin, Jr. These limits can be raised through a conference call of the Fund's executive committee.
Habiby and Marnie Dawson, assistant director of the Fund for migration affairs, reported that the new administration in Washington is expected to cut back funds now available through the Department of Health and Human Services, to support and re-locate refugees within the United States.
During 1980, Dawson stated, Episcopal Church parishes in 79 dioceses have sponsored 6,576 refugees, exceeding the goal of 6,000, and several hundred more have been assisted in being allowed to have asylum in this country.
Bishop Philip Smith of New Hampshire, chairman of the education and communication committee, reported that all but four dioceses now have active Presiding Bishop's Fund for World Relief representatives, designated in each case by the diocesan bishop. This has been made possible by the work of the Fund's network office team led by Mr. and Mrs. John C. Goodbody. Meetings with these diocesan representatives, usually on a provincial basis, will be held throughout 1981.
The first issue of a special Newsletter for these representatives will be distributed in March, and a new 58-slide overall presentation about the ministry of the Fund has been completed and will shortly be available for their use with diocesan groups. Meanwhile, the film Yes, A Difference continues to reach a widening audience; all copies at the ROA agency in Milwaukee are booked to April 1.
Bishop Smith brought news of one new contributor: The recently-elected United States Senator from New Hampshire, Warren B. Rudman, is donating any funds he receives from speaking engagements to three charities: the Catholic Charities of New Hampshire, the Combined Jewish Appeal of Greater Manchester, and the Presiding Bishop's Fund for World Relief.