Continued: Editorial: Foundation should not shirk its primary goal: Aiding the needy

In response to the July 30 editorial, "Bush Foundation makes a smart shift," we might pause and admire, briefly, the grand design of a major foundation in Minnesota, and then ask, "Where, in their thinking, is their traditional but indispensable contribution to community social services' agencies?" In the brave new world of the foundation's search for "courageous leaders and vibrant communities," have they put aside their major contribution to community agencies that are a necessary part of our safety net for troubled families and children? And, at a time of crisis, when their survival is at stake?

It is not only the infrastructure of roads and bridges that is crumbling, but there are now gaping holes in the safety net of human services for fragile families and their high-risk children.

For the first time in the history of philanthropy and public social services, the working poor are worse off than the dependent poor who can still stay somewhat afloat with MFIP, Medicaid, WIC, and food stamps.

The Deficit Reduction Act did its job. Eligibility for these programs as a subsidy to low-income working parents and children was eliminated. Further, working poor families are no longer eligible for quality child care. Community agencies centered on family and children's services are the lifeline for the working poor.

And this brings us to a reminder. Foundations are a protected class. Their considerable private fortunes are exempted from tax obligations. But they are not exempt from public scrutiny. When they go high-flying into the abstractions of strategies developed by "think tanks," we should take note.

For instance, we should be skeptical of expending huge resources on such vague goals such as "vibrant communities," at a time when the benevolent-sounding "community" is undergoing sharp scrutiny, at ground level. Who speaks for the community? Is community the problem or the solution?

Grand designs for solving problems of the human condition always leave us with an unwieldy heap of uninterpreted data. In the end, we are left with the tangled problems of hunger, shelter, unloved children, and dangerous neighborhoods. We need the Bush Foundation not to forsake their responses to tangible problems.

Esther Wattenberg is a professor at the School of Social Work and an associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs at the University of Minnesota.

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