TABLE D States' Efforts to Reach Out to FBOs Faith-based Liaisons * 14 states have formally designated a staff person(s) to serve as liaisons to the faith community (AZ, AR, CA, CO, GA. MD, NJ. NY, NC, OH, OK, PA, TX, VA). Conferences * VA, CO, TX, NJ, IN, OH and PA are among those that have sponsored state wide or regional info conferences *OK and UT are currently planning such events Technical Assistance *IN and TX have formal systems for providing TA to FBOs Monitoring/Tracking CC Implementation *TX has a formal system Does not include contracts with two FBOs that receive money on a per client basis. Mr. CHABOT. Reverend Jones. STATEMENT OF REVEREND DONNA LAWRENCE JONES, COOKMAN UNITED METHODIST CHURCH, PHILADELPHIA, PA Reverend JONES. My name is Reverend Jones, Donna Jones, from Cookman United Methodist Church in north Philadelphia. Cookman Church was reformed about 10 years ago in 1989. The church is a relatively small congregation, a hundred members. And we are in a community that is considered economically depressed. The average income of the 30,000 residents just in our zip code is about $12,000 per year. The unemployment rate is about 62 percent. The majority of people in our community are either unemployed or have never been employed. There is a high incidence of drugs and alcohol addiction and 65 percent of ex offenders in our State return to our zip code at some place along the way. Our church noticing all of these things, because our community is our church community is made up of residents in the community, about 7 or 8 years ago started to do the traditional churchy things that we do could do. And that was, we offered energy assistance, grants just through the local church, help people to get their lights turned back on and to buy fuel. We offered food, we offered clothes. We offered after-school care for the children. What we started to see as time when on, we started to see the same people coming back over and over again because those direct assistance strategies and enabling people to overcome poverty. So the membership came together, certain representatives came together of that membership to form a team to determine what we could do to help empower people to move beyond where they were. We decided that at the same time we would offer what assistance we could on a greater level. So we started to offer some job coaching, some job placement activities, just through a volunteer basis. But we are only able to help a few people a month. We weren't able to do it on a large scale. We also found that we were limited in what we were able to do because at that time, I think I was the only member of the church that had a college degree and we had very-not a whole lot of people with high school diplomas. So it becomes difficult to really empower people when empowering volunteers had issues of empowerment themselves. So we decided that we wanted to continue with the church to do what we were doing, we started to look at how we could expand, how we could raise money to expand. And at that time we heard about the charitable choice provision. Our church does not have a separate secular 501(c)(3) but as a united methodist church we do fall under the 501(c)(3) denomination. Because we are a small church, we were still solidifying our church board. And it was going to put our church in an uncomfortable position, and probably an unnecessary position to try to do all the work necessary at that time to continue to grow the church, continue to do the ministry and set up a separate organization. So we heard about the charitable choice provision. What it said to us was we could really concentrate on ministry, we could continue to do what we were doing, we could expand what we were doing and we could do it as a local church, so we signed on. Our first grant was a community solutions grant and that grant, the basis of it was that the State of Pennsylvania looked out and reached out to the community to find out what organizations were already doing in their communities to empower citizens and enable persons to move from welfare to sufficiency. We decided that that was the grant for us. We went after it. And to our surprise we received it. That grant allowed us to do a couple of things that we wouldn't have been able to do otherwise. It allowed us to expand our capacity to reach people. So instead of reaching one or two people per month, we would reach 20 or 30. It also allowed us to hire professional staff. We did not expand our staff greatly, but we were able to hire a job developer and we were able to hire a case manager which we would not have been able to do and we did not have volunteers within our organization who could do it. And we had in the past tried to solicit people from the suburbs to come in and do it, or from other sections of Philly to come in and do it, but they weren't exactly willing to come into north Philly to do it. So-but we were able to hire, and that made a big difference in our program. We also learned a lot. We received a State monitor. And the monitor helped us with capacity building. The monitor helped us to connect with the State databases, which tremendously increased our ability to follow up. In the long run, what we have is much, much, much more reach than we would have had without charitable choice. And for us, to be a relative unsophisticated organization, that was very exciting to us. We also found that we were offering something that was unique to our community. People were becoming very confused in county assistance offices and other larger organizations where they were going for services and they would come back to us to find out what was going on. So we found that because we were in the community and people knew us, and they were passing by into the church. We were safe; they would come in to us and they would share at levels that they were embarrassed to share in the social organizations that were around. We also found that we got greater information about family situations, about domestic violence, about other barriers to employment that were happening in the house than other agencies were receiving. We also were because we were a church, there was an expectation that was different than what they would have expected to have seen in a local agency. So people expected that we would help them. People expected we wouldn't just run in and take their children away from them. People expected us to go the extra mile. Also because we were a church, we were more flexible in our ability to deliver services. When a young woman comes in to us and this has happened before, and she has just been abused and she is having a hard time and she can't meet the 5-day requirement or you get cut off that we had at the time in Pennsylvania, she could come in and say look, you know, I am really having a hard time, my husband just beat me up, I don't know what to do. We can make phone call after phone call, but if that is Friday night, there is not a whole lot of options for here. And there is not a whole lot of options that she was willing to do and leave their children. But because we are a church and not an agency, we were able to say look, we have got some cots, we have some food, we have got some space. You can stay here and we have some volunteers to stay with you. Those are the types of things that churches can do that agencies often can't do for all kinds of reasons. And we have made those kind of interventions on many occasions. And also, have been able to go with people-a lot of times people are having trouble just fulfilling their work requirements or fulfilling other requirements of education and employment, run into other barriers that relate to maybe sick family members or things like that. Because we were a church, we are able to go out in the community in a larger radius and were able to visit with people and extended families that might not even be on assistance. And what we found is that combination of what we normally do as a church, plus the financial benefit of being able to have a qualified staff, plus the technical assistance, has caused us to really be able to reach out and in a much broader and deeper level. We are seeing a lot of repeat business from not just our clients, but they are coming back with their children, they are coming back with brothers and sisters and others in the community that had fallen through the cracks. I mean, because of what we have done to help enable family members. I think I have to stop there. Thank you. Mr. CHABOT. Thank you very much, Reverend Jones. We appreciate it. [The prepared statement of Reverend Donna Lawrence Jones follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF REVEREND DONNA LAWRENCE JONES Like many urban African American churches, Cookman already had a history of social ministries designed to empower its community. Although many social service agencies exist in the neighborhood, issues of distrust, mis-information, and dis-respect for poor people's issues caused persons in need to seek alternative solutions through various community based-organizations (including churches) to their lifechallenges. All of our outreach efforts have always been open to all residents regardless of faith commitment. As welfare reform became a reality, we started to see more and more residents coming to us for referrals, tutoring and other assistance. We also found many residents were very confused by the system and by their county assistance office personnel. In order to meet their needs we chose to utilize the Charitable Choice provision to compete for federal funding for our what was becoming an increased demand on assistance for persons receiving TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families) benefits. We have also, like many churches in our area, chosen not to actively proselytize persons in need of our help, feeling that it is not appropriate to in any way force religion on the needy. Therefore, when charitable choice came our way, we did not see that it would impede what we were used to doing in anyway. We did see it as a Godsend. For years, our small congregation had been providing various services to needy families with a very limited budget. This put a tremendous strain on too few volunteers. And, since we are not a "professional church" (Other than myself, there is only one other person with a post-high school diploma) we started to feel the weight of trying to provide better quality services in response to person's felt needs. We found our community agencies tried hard, but were unable to handle the volume of issues found in our high-risk community alone. The additional funding allowed us to hire targeted staff, and improve our curriculum. The extra staff actually made it easier to solicit volunteers, as they were not so easily burnt-out. Our experience with the State of Pennsylvania has overall been very good. We had a challenging start as we each tried to understand the freedoms and restrictions of Charitable Choice. But we worked together with our monitor to develop what we feel has been a beneficial collaboration for the citizens in our area who have fallen through the systemic cracks. This help enabled us to expand our program of education, life-skills, job placement, job development and computer literacy, and children and youth services. We offer a voluntary Bible Study at the beginning of the day. We advertise that we have a Christian program, but we are careful during orientation and on a regular basis through out the program to let clients know that religious activities are not mandatory and that they have every right to pursue other valuable activities at the same time, such as: computer lab, job search activities, or counseling/case management. So far we have served 182 women. At last count, our job placement rate at 20 hours/week or greater was 87%. We have a separate account for funds received for the welfare to work program, and the church continues to have to meet its own operating and ministry expenses. We make a distinction (both now and before charitable choice) between what we do in mission and what we do in evangelism. We do not see social service (helping the needy) as evangelism so we have never had an issue with trying to proselytize someone who needs help. The government collaboration has increased the level of bureaucracy and paper work we were used to. However, for the most part this has been welcomed. We have better records than we would have every dreamed of having before and we are linked to a State Wide database that has been exceptionally helpful to us in followup with the families we help. While some of the paper requirements are tedious, most are necessary such as financial records, case notes, accurate client files, and employer and family information. Although it was a challenge for us in the early |