National Council of Nonprofits Implores Government Leaders to Play Nice!

The National Council of Nonprofits has sent a letter to President Trump and congressional leaders of both parties urging an immediate re-opening of the government.  Here is an excerpt from the letter:

Direct Harm to Nonprofits: Charitable nonprofits – and therefore the people and communities they serve — have been suffering direct harm from the shutdown. For instance, furloughed federal employees, kept from their jobs, cannot issue grants or contracts to nonprofits and cannot make payments to reimburse nonprofits for work they already have performed for the government. People in need still turn to nonprofits seeking assistance because they can’t wait for policymakers to agree. As this shutdown drags on, these and other organizations are forced to take out lines of credit or layoff staff and reduce or eliminate certain services, costs in economic and human terms that will never be recovered even when government operations return to normal.

Nonprofits as Collateral Damage: Equally harmful are the indirect, yet still significant financial and human costs of the shutdown that charitable organizations are experiencing with increasing frequency. Furloughed federal employees who previously were regular contributors to the Combined Federal Campaign are now showing up at local food banks seeking boxes of food to tide them over until reason prevails in Washington. They are joining the already long lines of individuals seeking assistance. Nonprofits providing various forms of human services are being called upon to provide support for new populations of persons in need – federal employees and contractors out of work through no fault of their own. And most tragically, we are learning of the toll your failure to reach agreement is playing out in terms of stressing worried couples and parents to the point of forcing some family members to seek protection at domestic violence shelters – many of which will not be  receiving their funding due to the shutdown. The dollars and hours of service diverted from nonprofit missions to address this politician-inflicted crisis will never be recouped and the unnecessary human toll will not be erased in too many instances.

For media coverage on the shut-down’s impact on nonprofits, see this article in the Washington Post.  

Darryll K. Jones