New York Nonprofit Review June 2016

MEDIA - REVIEW DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

Issue N°9 June 6th, 2016

NEWS

DOI RELEASES SECOND SCATHING REPORT Read more page 16-17

NOTABLES

SP OTLIGHT : HEALTH CARE

LGBT HEALTH CARE AND DSRIP

CEO CORNER: JESS DANNHAUSER ON THE “HAMILTON” CONNECTION

p.22-23

REPORTS OF NEGLECT AT TOP NURSING HOME p.24-27

Read more page 10

AGENCY OF THE MONTH

NEWS

SCAN N Y

Read more on page 9

Billy Green leads a GLASS-sponsored “Over the Rainbow” panel discussing issues of LGBTQ inclusion.

PERSPECTIVES

REPRESENTATION FOR “CHAINED” JEWISH WOMEN Read more page 18

THE TROUBLE WITH CITY CONTRACTS Read more page 29

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

October 2016, Downtown NYC Background There are 30+ million millennial employees in today’s workforce. Like no other previous group, this generation of future leaders will have a profound impact on the workplace of tomorrow. The generation raised in a world of instant response and information will change the game of how you operate your organization; the environment where you conduct business and when business is done.

Investing in your human capital now will help you set a blueprint for a successful workforce of the future.

Nonprofit WorkCon Recruiting, engaging and retaining top talent is crucial for any nonprofit to succeed. This event will present behavioral research and feature industry experts who will discuss how to align talent management strategies necessary for an evolving workforce. Featured speakers and panel presenters will share insights to help you leverage culture and human capital management practices to drive organizational growth.

Panel discussions will include: • Understanding the potential of data and what it means for making smarter decisions about your business • From the boomer’s corner office to millennials open design/sharing space: Creating an innovative work environment • What are the latest trends in the New York City real estate market and what does it mean for companies?

• How do you communicate effectively with a generation of who grew up in the digital age?

• How do you hire and retain millennials and invest in people practices that ensure company growth?.

• Biggest challenges and next solutions in building your senior management teams Audience Executive leadership from New York’s nonprofits including Executive Directors, CEOs, Directors of HR, Talent Managers, COOs, and CFOs. Other participants will include education providers, career and technical educators, government and agency officials, economic development professionals, and other community-based organizations and service providers.

We are currently looking for speakers and panelists for this event. For more information please contact Lissa Blake at 646 517 2741 or lblake@cityandstateny.com or visit our web site at www.nynmedia.com/events.

July 21, 2016 8:00am –10:00am U

ND

ER FOR

TY

RISI NG STARS

THE CAPITAL GRILLE 120 Broadway New York, NY 10271

For the second year, New York Nonprofit Media is recognizing 40 of New York’s rising stars in the nonprofit world under the age of 40.

Winners will be profiled in a special event issue of our print publication that will be out in time for our event on July 21st . Our class of 2016 winners will be announced in mid - June.

For more information please contact Lissa Blake at 646 517 2741 or lblake@cityandstateny.com or visit our web site at www.nynmedia.com/events.

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June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

JUNE 2016

CONTENTS TRADE TIPS

5. Improving the quality of your nonprofit’s audit 6. Inspiring staff and volunteer excellence 7. Revenue Generation: Fresh ideas to help your nonprofit raise funds

NOTABLES

8. NYN Media honors 2016 Front-Line Heroes 9. Agency of the Month: Supportive Children’s Advocacy Network 10. CEO Corner: Jess Dannhauser, Graham Windham 10: CEO Corner: Fred Shack, Urban Pathways 11. At the Board Table: Transitioning away from a founder-driven board 12. Recent galas and events

NEWS

13. New federal procurement standards 14. City Council re-examines nonprofit procurement policies 15. City Council, Banks discuss 90-day review’s impacts on nonprofits 16. DOI assails Close to Home oversight 17. DOI releases second scathing report on ACS 18. Breaking the chain 20. Why nonprofits should be prepared for the worst 20. Addressing the homelessness crisis

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The Bridge

Services

Brooklyn Community Services

Mercy Haven

CAMBA

Mercy Home for Children

Cerebral Palsy of Westchester

MercyFirst

Child Care Council of Suffolk, Inc.

New Alternatives for Children

Children's Home of Poughkeepsie

New York Asian Women's Center

Children's Village

New York Common Pantry

COFCCA

Ohel Children's Home & Family

Communilife

Services

Community Counseling & Mediation

PSCH

Concern for Independent Living

Public Health Solutions

The Day Care Council of New York

QSAC

The Doe Fund

Richmond Community Services

East Side House

SCAN New York

Family Services of Westchester

SCO Family of Services, Inc.

FedCap

Seaman's Society for Children &

Forestdale

Families

Good Shepherd Services

Sheltering Arms

Graham Windham Services for

Special Citizen's Futures Unlimited

Families and Children

St. Catherine's Center for Children

Green Chimneys

St. Christopher's Inc.

Greystone Programs, Inc.

St. Dominic's Home

The Guild for Exceptional Children

St. Francis Friends of the Poor

Health and Welfare Council of Long

Stanley M. Isaacs Neighborhood Center

Island

Staten Island Mental Health Society

Heartshare Human Services of NY

Stonewall Foundation

Henry St. Settlement

SUS

Hour Children

United Cerebral Palsy of NYC

Human Services Council

United Neighborhood Houses of NY

Independence Residences

University Settlement/The Door

Institute for Community Living

Vanderheyden Hall

InterAgency Council of

Visions/Services for the Blind

Developmental Disabilities

William F. Ryan Community

Jawonio

Health Center

SPOTLIGHT

PERSPECTIVES

CAREERS

21. SAGE Helps LGBT seniors manage chronic disease 22. LGBT health care nonprofits foresee DSRIP problems 24. Reports of neglect at New York nursing homes

27. Aimée Simpierre: De Blasio controversy is giving nonprofits a bad name 28. Nancy Wackstein: Thoughts on nonprofit leadership 29. JoAnne Page: The trouble with city contracts 30. Gregory Brender: Fighting for a fairer budget on the steps of City Hall

30. The go-to-career center for New York’s nonprofit industry

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK

AIMÉE SIMPIERRE Editor-at-large

I

n this issue, we spotlight health care concerns, particularly among the elderly and LGBT communities. In honor of Gay Pride month, we acknowledge that New York is at the forefront of addressing LGBT concerns and that nonprofits like our agency of the month, SCAN NY, and SAGE (Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders) are creating new programs that provide safe spaces where the emotional health of young people and the physical health of older adults can be addressed. However, nonprofit community health care providers are facing various challenges as they navigate Medicaid’s value-based payment system which threaten their ability to address the needs of smaller target populations – like the LGBT community.

In addition, this issue features the final part of a three part in-depth series on nursing homes. Our reporter Frank Runyeon’s thorough investigative piece examines one of the city’s most respected nursing homes, the Hebrew Home, and sheds light on the fact that even in top-rated nursing homesß lax oversight can lead to life-threatening instances of neglect. The complete series is available on our website in the spotlight section.

In addition, with this issue we bid farewell to Jeffrey Stein, our contributing editor, whose smart reporting helped build the profile of this publication to what it is today. We wish him much success in his future endeavors.

Moving forward, watch for the byline of Dan Rosenblum, our new senior reporter, who has extensive experience covering city government, education, public housing and labor unions. We are also launching NYN Media podcasts. We’ll be taking many of our videotaped segments – such as the CEO Corner and At the Board Table – and moving them to a podcast format so we can have more in-depth conversations with our interviewees that you can enjoy at your leisure via iTunes or Stitcher. Stay tuned to the NYN Daily e-newsletter and to the website for updates related to the podcast launch and be sure to check the events page on our website for information about our upcoming 40 under 40 and MarkCon events. I look forward to seeing you all there.

How well do you tell your organization’s story to donors?

Volunteers? Your Board? Funders? Government partners?

Do better.

Find out how we can help.

Visit us at www.anatgerstein.com or call us at 718-793-2211 4

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TRADE TIPS

TIPS FOR IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF YOUR NONPROFIT’S AUDIT

By SIBI THOMAS

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udit quality is one of the most discussed topics in the accounting and auditing profession. Audit quality involves both qualitative and quantitative elements, some of which are not easily measurable. It is subjective and viewed differently by different stakeholders based on their expectations and perceptions. It’s important for all the involved stakeholders to align their expectations in order to produce a quality audit.

Auditing is a watchdog function, however a financial statement audit is not designed or intended to provide absolute assurance. It provides reasonable assurance. This fact can result in a difference in expectations by various stakeholders. It is the difference between what the public and financial statement users believe auditors are responsible for and what auditors themselves believe their responsibilities to be. In order to bridge this “expectation gap,” everyone involved must be informed and educated about the auditing process. The expectation gap can cause different stakeholders to define and measure audit quality differently. An auditor may feel he or she performed a high-quality audit, while the audit committee or management staff may feel otherwise.

Auditors advise about appropriate accounting principles and how to apply them, and they assist in the preparation of financial statements.

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While the primary responsibility for conducting quality audits rests with the auditors, the board’s audit committee and management staff at the nonprofit must understand that ultimate responsibility for the presentation of financial statements and the accuracy of the reporting rests with the management of the organization. In addition, management is also responsible for establishing and maintaining internal controls, designing and implementing programs and establishing controls to prevent and detect fraud.

Third-party regulators also have a role to play in helping to ensure audit quality.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, overseer of public company audits, issued a concept release in July 2015 identifying 28 Audit Quality Indicators in three major areas titled: Audit Professionals, Audit Process and Audit Results. The indicators state that auditors must be knowledgeable, skilled, and demonstrate appropriate values and ethics.

There should also be sufficient time allocated to perform the audit work.

The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants issued a sixpoint plan in May of 2015 to improve audit quality. The plan includes improving accounting education from the high school level upward, improving current auditing standards and ethics requirements, providing resources and support for auditors

through workshops and trainings, improving the quality of peer reviews, conducting long-term monitoring of audit firms and strictly enforcing the code of professional conduct. As an auditor for some of the largest and most complex nonprofit organizations, I see a constant focus on improvements. AICPA is doing an excellent job with promoting resources and setting standards to improve audit quality.

So what can nonprofit organizations do to improve the audit quality at their organizations?

Audit oversight function: The Nonprofit Revitalization Act of 2013 enacted in New York highlighted the importance of having an appropriate audit oversight function at your nonprofit. Many organizations have complied with the law by designating individuals or board committees to perform audit oversight functions.

Nonprofit organizations with smaller boards generally have the whole board assume responsibility for conducting audit oversight while those with larger boards tend to designate an audit committee to carry out the oversight function.

Nonprofits should consider having a separate audit charter or section within their bylaws that identifies the duties and responsibilities of an audit committee and ensures all members of the audit committee are independent and no conflicts of interest exist. Audit committee

members must also have enough technical expertise to carry out their responsibilities objectively. They must be accountable for evaluating the quality of the audit on a continuous basis. Having a true accounting/ finance professional on the audit committee could add tremendous value.

One of the areas of focus lately is how often a nonprofit organization should change its auditor. There are differing views on this subject. Rotating the audit firm or partner can result in loss of good institutional knowledge that is much needed in the financial reporting environment but it does help mitigate the “familiarity risk.” Some of my clients have taken a different approach that has proven to be very effective: rotating the audit manager or auditor in charge of the fieldwork. Currently there’s no mandated requirement to rotate audit firms or partners for nonprofit organizations.

Appropriate communication between stakeholders: Engaging the audit committee is important for a quality audit. At a minimum the auditors should meet with the nonprofit’s audit committee twice during the audit process – before the commencement of the audit and after the completion of the audit. Pre-audit communication should define the nature, scope and timing of the audit and initiate open communication between the auditors and the audit committee. Post-audit meetings should discuss the audit results.

Audit committees’ desire information on the qualitative aspects of an audit, a report from Center for Audit Quality shows. This can be achieved through open dialogue between the auditors and the audit committee.

With audits under more scrutiny within the nonprofit sector, it is important to ensure that everyone is clear about expectations, that oversight functions for the auditing process are in place and communication between all stakeholders is open and transparent. These steps will help your organization produce a quality audit in partnership with a quality auditor. Remember, auditors work for the audit committee and they work with your nonprofit’s management staff.

Sibi Thomas, CPA, CFE, CGMA is a partner at the Nonprofit and Government Group at Marks Paneth LLP. Sibi focuses on audit, tax and advisory services to some of the largest and complex nonprofit organizations in New York. Sibi is also an adjunct faculty at New York University. He can be reached at sthomas@markspaneth.com and on Twitter at @SibiThomas_ .

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TRADE TIPS

INSPIRING STAFF AND VOLUNTEER EXCELLENCE

By PAULA GAVIN Inspiring mission-driven staff: Staff in nonprofits succeed when they are personally mission-driven and when the organization sets clear expectations, fosters trust, allocates resources to priorities, commits to caring supervision, offers training and recognizes performance. Mission-driven staff are motivated by the organization's mission, vision, values, plans, goals and standards of excellence.

S

taff and volunteers are the engine of great nonprofits, and can truly power the organization forward when they feel connected to its mission and results.

Here are some quick tips for inspiring excellence among the staff and volunteers at your nonprofit.

The strategic plan: The nonprofit's strategic plan sets the direction of the organization and serves as a foundation for staff and volunteer excellence. Staff development and volunteer development should be critical goals within the strategic plan.

Structure follows strategy: Great nonprofits continuously assess their organizational structure based on the organization's strategic and annual plans and feedback from staff and clients on the organization's effectiveness.

Staffing for excellence: Staff – the program providers, service delivery team and administrators – are the keepers of the mission. They are the voice. Every staff person selected must possess skill and will to both do the job and live the mission.

Staffing excellence requires a continuous development cycle of: up-to-date job descriptions, annual objectives, perfor-

mance reviews, training and career plans and code of conduct commitments. Compensation should be fair and equitable based on work and market comparisons.

There should also be a written action plan that includes daily, weekly, monthly and annual strategies for recognizing and acknowledging staff.

considered by every nonprofit in its strategic plan, mission and vision. The strategic plan should define the full continuum of volunteer engagement, from serving on the board of directors to participating in recurring volunteer programs to one time volunteer service by participants and community members.

Building staff skill and will through ownership of the mission: The nonprofit's goal should be to develop both staff skill and will so that each and every staff employee feels they have "the best job in the world," and ownership of the mission.

Maintaining communications systems, transparency and authenticity are critical to building skill and will and ownership of mission. Leadership sets the tone but communications should be horizontal and vertical at every staff and volunteer level.

Volunteerism: A nonprofit's strategic plan should establish the strategic value and centrality of volunteers to the organization. The origin of the nonprofit sector was voluntary and this legacy should be

Volunteer management system: Volunteer engagement and a continuum of volunteer roles – structured to support the strategic plan – is key to success. A great volunteer management system defines volunteer roles, recruiting, training, recognition and retention.

Paula Gavin is New York City's chief service officer, responsible for NYC Service.

NYC Service is the city agency which promotes, engages and supports volunteer service in New York City and connects volunteers to the city's greatest needs. She also spent many years in the nonprofit world, as executive director of New York City’s Fund for Public Advocacy and president and CEO of YMCA of Greater New York.

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TRADE TIPS

REVENUE GENERATION: FRESH IDEAS TO HELP YOUR NONPROFIT RAISE FUNDS

By R AFI MUSHER & SASCHA FREUDENHEIM

N

onprofit organizations are engaged in a zero-sum game, with more parties competing for a limited philanthropic pie cut into increasingly smaller slices.

In the last 35 years the nonprofit sector has exploded. In 1980, there were only 320,000 organizations registered as tax-exempt public charities. For 2015, that number is estimated to be more than 1 million. Meanwhile, charitable giving has hovered around 2 percent of GDP for much of the last four decades, yet many nonprofits still tap the same funding sources and rely on the same tired approaches – often incurring a heavy cost of fundraising.

It’s time to change the game.

Nonprofits urgently need to reconsider their approaches and think more creatively about raising capital. Most nonprofits have assets that are either underutilized, not utilized during an “off-season” or not utilized at all. Non-donation revenue streams can be created by charging the public or other businesses a fee to use or access a nonprofit’s assets when they’re not being utilized. Similarly, newer online fundraising techniques and platforms aimed at helping specific categories of nonprofits can raise funds from more people with lower costs per dollar raised.

Recent research by Stax Inc. identified that two-thirds of Fortune 200 CEOs sit on an average of two nonprofit boards.

Combine this with millennials’ desire to make an impact and corporations’ interest in providing more corporate social responsibility offerings and there may be an opportunity for nonprofits to experiment with new ideas and new partners to

Camp Ramah participants. The camp's California location books special events during its offseason to generate extra revenue. leaving its historic facility intact. The theater company was able to monetize its unused land value and generate funds for major renovations while keeping its original location.

The DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts, which fosters the creation, exhibition and exploration of contemporary sculpture and art, loans works of art to corporations around Boston for a fee, generating more than $650,000 per year that goes toward the organization's annual

NONPROFITS URGENTLY NEED TO RECONSIDER THEIR APPROACHES AND THINK MORE CREATIVELY ABOUT RAISING CAPITAL. think through and test these ideas.

Consider these three examples of nonprofits around the country that successfully created new revenue streams in ways that either aligned with their mission – or did not detract from their mission – and made use of corporate partnerships: Symphony Space, a nonprofit theater in Manhattan, struck a deal with the developer Related Companies in which Related paid for the air rights to build around and over the performance space, NYNmedia.com

budget. This partnership extends the museum’s branding and revenue.

Camp Ramah’s Ojai, California location books corporate meetings, retreats, family weekends and other special events during its off-season, generating enough additional revenue to sustain their corporate facilities and upgrade the quality of Camp Ramah’s overall maintenance while broadening its brand, reach and ability to serve the community.

Nonprofits also have to think about more cost-effective fundraising efforts.

The emergence of niche crowdfunding platforms offers fundraising that can help your nonprofit extend its reach, offers an easier way to engage potential supporters and track funders and helps make each one a champion for your cause by quickly recognizing their support. It also allows nonprofits to fundraise without an event. Crowdfunding does require some research and consideration to make it a good fit for your team. For example, a web-based platform called Edco focuses entirely on K-12, making it easy for teams, clubs and the schools themselves to express their programs, share them with the community and start engaging, raising funds and tracking donations with transparency. It allows schools to target the same people in the community who would traditionally be targets for wrapping paper or candy sales. While traditional school fundraisers yield 50 cents on the dollar (and people do not always want the products), schools using Edco get almost twice the proceeds – 95 cents on the dollar.

When implementing these strategies, nonprofits must bear in mind that income over $1,000 may have to be reported as Unrelated Business Income tax.

They will also want to proceed carefully and be very transparent to all relevant stakeholders about any new revenue streams to avoid perceived or actual conflicts of interest.

Nonprofit leaders may be tentative about some of these opportunities to boost revenue generation and move to more cost-effective fundraising, but if they care about expansion, they have an

obligation to explore them – not only to expand the pool of capital for nonprofits but also to establish themselves as leaders in this area. An institution may use these opportunities to lay the groundwork for long-term fundraising by introducing new audiences to its good work, building brand awareness and widening the funnel for new donors.

The good news is that there are numerous nonprofit leaders interested in growing the impact of their organizations and an abundance of resources available to help them, including board members, corporations like The Related Companies, millennials and new social ventures like Edco. These resources and partnerships bring new skills and resources to the table, creating value for the organization and personal development for its staff. All this contributes to the organization’s vibrancy and sustainability over the long haul.

Rafi Musher is the founder of Stax Inc., a global strategy consultancy and CEO of Stax Dev Corp, which develops new ventures and joint ventures, often with a social benefit and impact. He is also founder of Israel & Co., a 501(c)3, and former chairman of Friends of Bronx Lab School, a public high school in New York City.

Sascha Freudenheim is co-founder and principal of PAVE Communications & Consulting, a firm dedicated to communications and consulting to the creative disciplines. He is on the board of Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, his alma mater, and Congregation Ansche Chesed in New York City.

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NOTABLES

NYN MEDIA HONORS 2016 FRONT-LINE HEROES

By AIMÉE SIMPIERRE

Front-Line Hero and Lifetime Achievement Award winner Dr. Alan Shapiro, Children’s Health Fund, and supporters

A

s children they dreamed of becoming astronauts, farmers, Charlie’s Angels and ice skaters – they ended up becoming life-changers. Friends, family and colleagues gathered on the morning of April 26 at New York Law School to celebrate New York Nonprofit Me-

dia’s first class of Front Line Heroes: 26 individuals who have displayed excellence in their commitment to serving those in need. “(Front-Line Heroes) stand for the best of what nonprofits are all about,” said guest speaker Paula Gavin, Chief Service Officer at NYC Service.

“You’re mission-driven, you’re results-oriented and you’re people-focused – and that’s what makes the difference in nonprofits.”

Dr. Alan Shapiro, Senior Medical Director for Community Pediatric Programs – a collaboration between The Children’s Hospital at Montefiore and the Children’s Health Fund – was presented a Lifetime Achievement Award. He used his acceptance speech to draw the room’s attention to the plight of the most vulnerable.

“I’m the most fortunate because of the children and families I’ve worked with over the years,” Shapiro said.

“It’s pretty heartbreaking to wake up and you go to work, and you’re working with children who live on the street – homeless youth who have to live on subways and in parks because there’s not enough beds for them – they age out of foster care and there’s nowhere for them to go. We don’t put enough resources into that.”

Our heroes shared with NYN Media that they have staked out in front

of homes to make sure absentee participants were shepherded back to the services they needed, paid for shirts and ties out of their own pockets to help build a young person’s self esteem, created job opportunities where there were none and visited participants at their hospital beds.

All the while, many also spoke of a recognition that just a few turns of fate separated them from needing the services they were helping their clients access. It spoke of a humility and empathy that was reflected in all of their work.

Guest speaker Nancy Wackstein, director of community engagement and partnerships at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Social Service, summed up the level of appreciation for those in the room: “We all who function in executive roles and managerial roles at these agencies are actually the support staff, because it’s your work that is actually why we are all in business in the first place.”

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NOTABLES

AGENCY OF THE MONTH: SUPPORTIVE CHILDREN’S ADVOCACY NETWORK Empowering parents to promote education

By MICHELLE ARNOT

The Supportive Children's Advocacy Network's Reach for the Stars participants visit a college campus.

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high school diploma is still out of reach for 50 percent of East Harlem students and many of their peers in the South Bronx – the nation’s poorest catchment area where students consistently rank at the bottom in standardized tests.

While city officials have developed a neighborhood action plan to address this thorny issue and others East Harlem faces, Supportive Children’s Advocacy Network (SCAN), a nonprofit with a budget of $14.3 million that operates 23 program sites in the area, has developed a model that empowers not only young people but also their parents by engaging them to recruit participants, providing training and jobs and using them to help keep kids in school.

“Low test results in District 9 are not the teachers’ fault – they’re due to inadequate resources in the schools, a lack of computers, books and standard equipment, intersecting with systemic forces of poverty and segregation, which results in children learning less well,” said SCAN Executive Director Lewis Zuchman, who also serves as chairman of the Human Services Consortium of East Harlem and teaches at the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership at City College.

After nearly 30 years as a nonprofit leader in the East Harlem community, Zuchman has witnessed a deterioration in the quality of life among individuals in the area. “The confluence of concentrated poverty, segregation, a punitive criminal justice system and related systemic forces, have created an ever more imposing set of environmental obstacles for our young people," noted Zuchman.

However, Zuchman has seized an NYNmedia.com

opportunity to improve the education system by making a difference where students live: in their homes and communities. Rather than hire from the outside, Zuchman taps into the local talent pool “wherever possible.”

With 350 part-time and 110 full-time positions, SCAN is a major employer among the 1,000 families and 7,000 children that use its services on an annual basis.

“When I first told parents we needed their help, about 40 percent signed up for training right away,” he said. “Partnering with parents is a win-win for the community and for SCAN.” In 2015, SCAN partnered with the New York Junior League to launch a new initiative called “Reading Rangers.” Volunteers work one-on-one to share the love of reading with children and meet with parents monthly.

“We often talk of empowerment in word,” Zuchman stated, “however, preaching to parents and teens about how bright they are, or what they can accomplish, are just words. To employ said parent and teens, to give them responsibility, to promote parents to positions of program director, turns cheerleading into concrete action – action that demonstrates our faith in their capacity to do for themselves.

This is true empowerment.”

At the middle and high school levels, Zuchman is proud of “Reach for the Stars,” a successful program that partners with public and charter schools to provide 80 students a year with counseling, help with financial aid applications and other interventions. Any SCAN-affiliated young person – even one with a C average – is eligible to apply. Each year about 90 percent of former Reach for the Stars participants matriculate at top aca-

demic institutions, including the Ivy League. Current SCAN board member Jamel Oeser-Sweat, now an attorney, is an early graduate of the program.

“I remember Jamel as a bright kid who went on to win a Westinghouse Science Award and now he’s my boss,” said Zuchman with a smile. “The college completion rate of the students in our program exceeds that of the national average.”

A SCAN program breaking new ground within the teen population is Gay Lesbian And Straight Supporters (GLASS), which is the only community-based program in Upper Manhattan serving the full spectrum of LGBTQ youth of color from its headquarters at a NYCHA development.

Zuchman was inspired to start the program after attending the 50th reunion of the original Freedom Riders, of which he was a member. He was further inspired by a teenager who asked for a room to practice the dance style called voguing. “This young man

had been thrown out of the home by his mother, although she kept his twin brother – a gang leader – with her,” Zuchman said.

It was the second time Zuchman attempted to create a program for inner-city LGBTQ teens. His first effort, about 10 years earlier, “fell apart due both to the lack of sensitivity training as well as the fact that coming out in East Harlem is still a tough choice,” he said. In addition, Zuchman observed that the surrounding LGBTQ community was “siloed,” and considerable conflicts existed between different LGBTQ constituent groups. “I’m lucky to have a responsive, strong board that supported this effort,” Zuchman said, “and we were fortunate to win a $20,000 startup grant.”

In addition, Zuchman recruited the leadership of respected East Harlem activist Billy Green, a chemistry teacher at Frederick Douglass Academy, who has become the backbone of GLASS. Green, a semi-finalist for the 2014 Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network Educator of the Year Award, offers an open forum for dialogue and a safe haven for LGBTQ teens.

On May 7, GLASS hosted “Unsung Heroes” at the Silberman School of Social Work, a daylong seminar to honor Bayard Rustin, a closeted activist who mentored Martin Luther King and organized the March on Washington in 1963. At the final breakout session, 24 people including Zuchman and Rustin’s life partner, Walter Naegele, shared personal experiences and reflections. “We weren’t born in a closet,” Green said, “and we all have to learn how to deal with the world.”

The program is an example of SCAN’s mission to keep its community centers open to all and to address community needs as they arise. “The most important aspect of my duties as E.D. is to remain engaged with the community,” Zuchman said.

Billy Green leads a GLASS-sponsored “Over the Rainbow” panel discussing issues of LGBTQ inclusion.

9

Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NOTABLES

THE “HAMILTON” CONNECTION AND PAYING FOR REAL SOLUTIONS

CEO CORNER

Q&A with JESS DANNHAUSER Graham Windham

G

raham Windham President and CEO Jess Dannhauser sat down with New York Nonprofit Media Editor-at-large Aimée Simpierre just days after “Hamilton” won a Grammy to talk about the organization’s connection to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway musical, the challenge of finding new ways to support programming for families at risk and what it’s like to lead the nation’s oldest nonprofit, non-sectarian child welfare agency.

NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA: TELL US ABOUT THE EFFECT THAT “HAMILTON” HAS HAD ON YOUR ORGANIZATION AND ON THE PEOPLE YOU SERVE. Jess Dannhauser: About a year ago, Lin-Manuel gave us a gift when he found out that we were the organization that Eliza (Hamilton) had created with three other progressive women of their time, whose story really deserves to be told. And to have that be told in such a public way has been a spirit booster.

Probably most importantly though, has been their presence.

Phillipa Soo, who plays Eliza Hamilton, and her castmate Morgan (Marcell) have started something called the Eliza Project. They work with our kids every week on Tuesday afternoons. They understand; they don’t see them as kids who are somehow to be pitied or feel sorry for, they see them as kids who are incredibly capable.

NYN: HOW DOES BEING CEO OF AN ORGANIZATION THAT WAS FOUNDED BY A WOMAN, IN A TIME WHEN THAT WAS A RARE THING, IMPACT HOW YOU PRESENT THE LEGACY TO THE YOUNG PEOPLE THAT YOU SERVE?

JD: Well, it’s still true. Notwithstanding the fact that I’m the CEO, our board chair is a woman who really lives in Eliza’s legacy: she’s extremely generous, she is really, really intent that every one of our kids and every one of our families is delivered the type of care and service that they deserve. And most of our team are women and the leadership of the organization reflects our founding.

NYN: TITLE IV-E FUNDING WOULD DIRECT MORE FUNDING TOWARD PREVENTIVE SERVICES AS OPPOSED TO AFTER A CHILD IS REMOVED. WHAT NEEDS TO CHANGE TO ENCOURAGE PEOPLE TO BE MORE SUPPORTIVE OF KEEPING A FAMILY TOGETHER AS OPPOSED TO REMOVING THE CHILD? JD: So much federal policy has moved towards supporting families, keeping kids in families safely, but the funding stream has stayed the same. And they’ve created waivers for cities and states to get around the rules that really target most of the money to be after a child is removed from their home and is intended to pay for quality foster care – but not a lot of support to the parent.

New York has been a leader in bringing funding to support those

policy changes, and now it’s time for the federal government to do the same. So we’re really encouraged that Sen. (Ron) Wyden and Sen. (Orrin) Hatch are hopefully going to introduce this bill that would create, for the first time, the opportunity to spend that IV-E funding on preventive services. And there’s more we can do as a city. Today most families, to get family support of the variety that we provide, need to sign up and say that their children are at risk of foster care. That’s a very hard thing for a family to do.

NYN: WHAT IS THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE YOUR ORGANIZATION IS FACING? JD: I think that most of them are about finding a way to pursue opportunity in a funding environment that is tight and tough. Not only is the struggle just sort of keeping one’s head above water, it’s about the opportunity cost to do things that you would like to do.

The normative coaching and neighbor-to-neighbor type supports I think too often have fallen to the wayside in favor of professionalized supports. The professionalized supports are important, but they are a piece of the solution.

LONG-TERM SOLUTIONS FOR PEOPLE LIVING ON THE STREET and clarity. Watch the full interview at nynmedia.com.

CEO CORNER

Q&A with FRED SHACK Urban Pathways

U

rban Pathways helps to connect homeless New Yorkers with housing and jobs. Its chief executive officer, Fred Shack, stopped by NYN Media’s office to speak about the central importance of housing as a solution to displacement and what it costs to keep homeless individuals on the street. This interview has been edited for content

10

NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA: WHERE DO YOU SEE THE CITY’S HOMELESS AND SUPPORTIVE HOUSING POLICY MOVING, PARTICULARLY FOR THE CHRONICALLY HOMELESS? Fred Shack: We’ve been working for the last year and a half to two years trying to get another commitment from both city and state to increase the supply of supportive housing, because we really see that as being the alternative to people living on the street. But the number of units that we have far surpasses what we’ve gotten in the past and it’s going to make a substantial difference in our ability to provide long-term options for people who are currently residing on the streets of New York City.

NYN: SOME PEOPLE ARGUE FOR EMPOWERMENT THROUGH JOB OPPORTUNITIES AS OPPOSED TO FOCUSING JUST ON HOUSING. WHY DO YOU THINK SUPPORTIVE HOUSING HAS TO BE FRONT-ANDCENTER IN THIS SOLUTION?

FS: The real solution for the lion’s share of the homeless population is housing that’s affordable. So for most of the families that are in the shelter now, if we had a set of housing subsidies that are funded both by the city, the state and the federal government, things like Section 8, it would go a long way in addressing that.

The population we’re most concerned about are people who have chronic conditions. These are folks who are seriously, persistently mentally ill, the folks that you see on the sidewalks and on the subways. These individuals cannot survive without having some kind of a supportive housing unit that will provide them with housing that’s affordable, first and foremost, but then provide them with the services they need in order to move towards recovery.

NYN: HOW DO YOU KEEP UP WITH THE DEMAND, PARTICULARLY IF SUBSIDIES ARE CUT? FS: The cost of keeping people on the street is extremely high. And you see it in emergency room visits, in emergency ambulance responses, in police time, in short-term hospital

stays, in short-term incarceration for violations of jumping turnstiles, and the minor sorts of criminal violations. It’s not free to keep a person on the street. The question is whether or not we want to invest in long-term solutions that really address the problem, or do we want to continue to invest in things like shelters, which is a short-term solution, or keeping people on the street and spending $20,000 to $30,000 a year to maintain them in that condition?

NYN: DO YOU THINK THE CITY’S GOAL OF REDUCING THE HOMELESS POPULATION BY 15 PERCENT BY NEXT YEAR IS A REALISTIC GOAL? FS: The last time we did a major investment in supportive housing, what we found is that the homeless population on the single side significantly dropped. I think the problem is that we’ve not sustained it. So if we can make the commitment, if we can do what works, we can continue to invest there – as opposed to somewhere else – we’ll find that while they may be overly ambitious at 15 percent this year, that those numbers will go down and they’ll stay down.

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NOTABLES

TRANSITIONING AWAY FROM A FOUNDER-DRIVEN BOARD ecutive director, David Condliffe, and transitioning away from being a founder-driven board. This interview has been edited for content and clarity. Watch the full interview at nynmedia.com.

AT THE BOARD TABLE

Q&A with DAN ARSHACK, Center for Community Alternatives

D

an Arshack Esq, is the recently appointed president of the board of Center for Community Alternatives, which works on providing community-based alternatives to incarceration. He talked with NYN Media about onboarding their new ex-

NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA: TELL US ABOUT YOUR NEW ROLE AS PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD. Dan Arshack: The Center for Community Alternatives was started by a visionary, brilliant woman, Marsha Weissman, who was the founder/director until recently. And we’re dealing with the often difficult and crucial transition of a board from a founder/ director board to a more mature board.

And that means bringing new people on board, looking at all of our policies and procedures.

NYN: HOW DID YOUR BOARD NAVIGATE THIS TRANSITION PERIOD AND ONBOARD YOUR NEW ED? DA: We were late to the game in making this transition; 20 years – in fact it was more than 20 years, but let’s just use a nice, round number – is too long, typically, as a general rule, for a founder/di-

rector to run an organization. At a point in time it inhibits its growth and its maturity. We felt it was very important to maintain Marsha’s involvement with CCA both leading up to the transition, during the transition and following the transition. She of course, like nobody else in the organization, has an institutional memory and a commitment to the mission and goal of the organization. And so to just simply cut that off and say goodbye would be a terrible loss for the organization.

NYN: WHAT WAS THE PRIMARY CHALLENGE THAT THE BOARD PRESENTED TO YOUR NEW ED? DA: Well there were several. The first and foremost for any organization was finances. Did we have a good handle on what our finances were, are, would be? How was that being communicated? There were some surprises that we were not completely aware of, that the board was not completely aware of. And in these days of post-FEGS disillusion, that was a troubling thing for the board to recognize, and, typical of a founder/ director board – that it did not have a

real granular understanding of the organization's finances. We always had the committees that any board should have, but like many founder/director boards they were often rubber stamp. It was a happy group of people who were friendly with the founder/director and were there because they were friendly with the founder/director – and there were no major mistakes made – but there was a lack of granular understanding of the organization’s finances – and a real acceptance of the responsibility, the fiduciary responsibility that a board needs to have in order for it not to fall into the “FEGS swamp.”

NYN: WHERE DO YOU ENVISION THE ORGANIZATION BEING IN FIVE YEARS? DA: I think CCA is poised to grow dramatically in the coming years. Our history is that we have relied almost entirely on government funding. We need to look and we are looking – and we’re finding – other sources of income that either don’t require us to be performance-based or have overhead built in at a rate that is actually sustainable.

Year the IRS started nonprofit status

Annual visitors to Prospect Park (in millions)

Cross street of Central Park Zoo’s main entrance

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NYNmedia.com

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11

Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NOTABLES

RECENT GALAS AND EVENTS

The New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, held its 2016 Spring Luncheon with Drew Barrymore at the Pierre Hotel. Attendees listened to Barrymore share personal stories from her recent book "Wildflowers."

The theme for Forestdale’s Annual Gala was Food, Family and Future.

It raised over $90,000 in support of the nonprofit's Teaching Kitchen programming. LouAnn Mannino, vice president of retail operations for Ridgewood Savings Bank, received the Community Partner Award.

Dinner for a Better New York, curated by James Beard winner, TV personality and SUS Urban Farms board member Chef Andrew Zimmern, raised $450,000 for SUS. Chefs Zimmern, Mark Welker and Scott Conant with SUS CEO Donna Colonna and Chefs George Mendes, Michael White and Marc Forgione.

Andrew J. Perel honors Erik Coleman with the Excellence in Sports & Philanthropy award at the Manhattan Youth Baseball Presents ‘Grades 2 Play’ Celebrity Charity Casino Night.

At the Women’s City Club of New York 's centennial Civic Spirit Awards Dinner, President Annette Choolfaian, Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, Lela Goren, Florence “Floss” Frucher, Robin Morgan, Sharon Richardson, Debra Zimmerman, Marcy Syms, and WCC Executive Director Jacqueline Ebanks.

The St. Elizabeth Seton Children’s Foundation hosted its second Cherish the Child Event, “Let’s Do Lunch!” at the Elizabeth Seton Pediatric Center. Shannon O’Neill Gallagher received the St. Elizabeth Seton Legacy Award. Lunch was catered by Raffaele Ronca of Rafele Ristorante, winner of “Chopped” on Food Network.

12

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

JCCA’s annual Celebration of Hope: A Gala to Benefit Children and Families at Jazz at Lincoln Center raised more than $700,000 to help vulnerable, abused children and families. From L to R: Cynthia Germanotta, President, Born This Way Foundation; Tony Award-winning actress and host for Celebration of Hope Joanna Gleason; Ronald E. Richter, CEO of JCCA; and actor Chris Sarandon.

The Girl Scouts of Greater New York hosted the Gold Achievement Gala at Cipriani 42nd Street.

This year’s gala celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Girl Scouts Gold Award. Honorees Barbara Hrbek Zucker, Girl Scout alumna and philanthropist; Rose M. Littlejohn, GSGNY Board chair and managing director at PwC; and Karen B. Peetz, president of BNY Mellon; and Girl Scouts.

The 37th Annual Sidewalks of New York Dinner, hosted by Big Brothers Big Sisters of NYC, raised more than $2 million. Mark Standish, Sidewalks 2016 Dinner chairman; Hector Batista, chief executive officer, Big Brothers Big Sisters of NYC; 2016 honorees Cam Newton, Carolina Panthers quarterback, and Lisa Sherman, president and chief executive officer, Ad Council; Marva Smalls, board president, Big Brothers Big Sisters of NYC; Deborah Roberts, Sidewalks 2016 host, author and correspondent, ABC News’ “20/20”; Al Roker, Sidewalks 2016 host, weather anchor, NBC’s “Today”; Charles Phillips, Sidewalks 2016 honoree.

NEWS

NEW FEDERAL PROCUREMENT STANDARDS

N

ew procurement standards that apply to purchases of goods and services made with federal funds will take effect for many nonprofits in 2017.

In an attempt to present a "government-wide framework for grants management" and improve efficiency, the Office of Management and Budget combined eight previous OMB Circulars into one set of “Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Award,” also referred to as “Uniform Guidance.”

Institutions whose fiscal year ends on June 30 must comply with the new standards by July 1, 2017. Key elements of the new procurement standards are below.

REVISED PROCUREMENT CATEGORIES Micro-purchase: Under the new standards, micro-purchases are the acquisition of supplies or services costing less than $3,000.

They may be awarded without soliciting competitive quotations if the nonprofit considers the price to be reasonable.

NYNmedia.com

By SIBI THOMAS Small purchase: Services, supplies or other property costing less than $150,000 are now considered “small purchase” and are subject to new relatively simple and informal procurement methods. Nonprofits must obtain price or rate quotations from an adequate number of qualified sources. The standards do not define “adequate number”.

Sealed bids: Sealed bids are used for purchases over $150,000 and primarily for construction contracts. Sealed bids are publicly solicited and a firm price contract is awarded to the responsible bidder. Generally the lowest bid is selected.

Competitive proposals: Competitive proposals are used for procurements over $150,000 and require a formal solicitation, and can be either fixed-price or cost-reimbursement contracts.

Competitive bids are used when sealed bids are not appropriate.

The contract is awarded to the proposal that is most advantageous to the program.

Sole source: This category

applies to procurements where the item is only available from a single source or when there is a public emergency that makes a competitive proposal process too time consuming. Sole source procurements require approval from the federal or pass-through funding source.

GENERAL PROCUREMENT STANDARDS Documented policies: Nonprofits must have documented procurement policies and procedures in place related to the purchase of goods and services with federal funds. These policies must be in accordance with the federal, state and local regulations. Federal awards must be used only for necessary items and there should be a full and open competitive procurement process.

Conflict of interest: There are now two types of conflict-of-interest policies required: employee conflict of interest and organizational conflict of interest. No employee, officer or agent may participate in the selection, award and or administration of a

federally funded contract if there is an actual or apparent conflict of interest. Organizational conflict of interest is a new requirement, under which relationships with a parent company, affiliate or subsidiary organization must be identified if they appear to or actually render the nonprofit unable to be impartial in conducting a procurement action.

Documentation of cost and price analysis and vendor selection: There should be sufficient documentation on the process of vendor selection and how the nonprofit reached its final decision. For example, the organization must conduct a lease/purchase analysis to identify which is more cost effective before entering into a lease or purchase contract.

All nonprofits should take a careful look at their existing procurement policies and procedures and make necessary updates to be in compliance with the new standards before the effective date.

Failure to do so can result in an audit finding and non-compliance with federal requirements.

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

CITY COUNCIL RE-EXAMINES NONPROFIT PROCUREMENT POLICIES

By JEFF STEIN

I

n response to calls from New York City nonprofits to revisit procurement policies that they say have contributed to a harsh and threatening operating environment, the City Council’s Committee on Contracts held an oversight hearing to discuss potential improvements to how the city does business with nonprofit human services providers.

The hearing came just weeks after the release of two comprehensive reports - one by the Human Services Council, a consortium of 170 nonprofit providers, and another from SeaChange Capital Partners, a merchant bank serving the nonprofit sector – that painted grim pictures of the sector’s health.

HSC’s report highlights the need for city contracts to pay the actual cost of providing services - includ-

14

ing so-called indirect costs, such as human resources and technological support and the escalation of wages and rent over time - and to disburse payments in a timely manner, unlike the lengthy delays that have become common. The report also urges city agencies to codify cooperation with nonprofits earlier in the contracting process, so that potential bidders can inform government partners about the true costs of services before requests for proposals are issued.

“I think that the recommendations that they lay out are a great roadmap for the city as we think about procurement reform,” said Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal, chairwoman of the Contracts Committee.

Rosenthal also highlighted a double-standard in the city’s contracting policies, which seem to offer more

favorable conditions for the private sector, including construction firms, than for nonprofit providers.

“When the city decides to build a $40 million bridge, they hire a construction company with that expertise,” Rosenthal said. “Contractors might complain that the payment for the contract takes too long – and human service providers have the same concern – but the city would never say to a construction company, ‘We’re going to pay you $35 million.

Try to get philanthropy, foundations, or other jobs that you do to pay for the remaining $5 million.’”

Rosenthal also pressed Michael Owh, director of the Mayor’s Office of Contract Services, on a common complaint from nonprofit providers: the recurrent need to take out lines of credit with private lenders in order to stay afloat while organizations

wait for government funds to disburse, despite the efforts of the city’s Returnable Grant Fund to provide gap funding for nonprofits.

In later testimony, nonprofit leaders continued to highlight the significant difference between overhead rates set by the federal Office of Management and Budget and those agreed to by city agencies, which often provide a much lower rate that becomes increasingly less meaningful as costs rise over the term of a contract.

“We get, initially from the city, 10 percent on most contracts, but because contracts last so long, that 10 percent rate that we start with is usually 3 percent or 5 percent later on in the contract, because all of our other bills have to be paid,” said Marla Simpson, executive director of Brooklyn Community Services.

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

COUNCIL MEMBERS, BANKS DISCUSS 90-DAY REVIEW’S IMPACT ON NONPROFITS

By JEFF STEIN

NYNmedia.com

of Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Herminia Palacio.

“As you’re well aware, the last thing that we want is to have something of an echo chamber within the administration,” said Levin.

Other council members expressed frustration over nonprofits that continue to face challenges getting paid, despite providing services. Councilman Rafael Salamanca, for example, mentioned Acacia Network’s struggle to bring one of its sites in The Bronx under contract with the city, even though DHS initially approached Acacia Network to take over the building.

“The violations that exist in the site are not Acacia’s doing,” Salamanca said. “Why are they being held accountable? Why is there a delay in the contract if they were not responsible from the very beginning?”

Banks responded that regardless of how violations came to be, any given provider must have a plan of corrections in place to address outstanding violations in order to have their contract registered.

“Where there are buildings that don’t have certificates of occupancy, or there are units with significant violations, we have to work with the provider for a plan of correction before we can get that contract registered,” Banks insisted.

He also said that DHS has been making loans to Acacia as it awaits the registration of its contract, and

that the agency planned to continue loan payments. However, nonprofits have questioned whether such loans are sufficient to offset the cost of late contract payments. As HSC General Counsel Michelle Jackson mentioned in her written testimony, nonprofits are often forced to borrow against a line of credit to meet payroll; the Brooklyn-based organization CAMBA reportedly absorbed $375,354 in interest payments last year alone.

“I also want to highlight that Acacia has been helpful in working with us to identify units that can be converted back to permanent housing, because the $60 a day in rent (per family at the site) is more than we would pay to restore units to permanent housing,” Banks added.

In addition to fostering cooperation on contract registration, Banks expressed hope that city Comptroller Scott Stringer would align future audits of homeless shelters with DHS’ inspection regime. Both Stringer and state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli have produced damning audits of the city’s homeless shelters, highlighting building code violations and rampant health and safety concerns.

“We’re going through buildings where things have built up for many years,” Banks said. “If you went out and monitored a building tomorrow, even though we’ve made thousands of repairs in the last two months, you may find a building that’s got chal-

lenges. For us, it’s more useful to take a joint approach and focus on where the work has been done and identify areas where the work still needs to be done.”

Those comments tied to a larger theme of inter-governmental cooperation, including with state regulators such as the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, an agency that has butted heads with Banks in repeated public feuds.

“The city cannot do this work alone,” said Nicole Bramstedt, director of policy for the homeless services provider Urban Pathways, who attended Thursday’s hearing. “The city and state need to work together with regard to the provision of homeless services in New York City, particularly the roll out of the new supportive housing units, as well as the city/state task force regarding state prison discharges to DHS shelters.”

On that point, Levin pressed Banks on whether city and state agencies had specifically communicated about plans to convene the proposed task force.

“We’ve communicated to our state partners our desire to do this work together,” Banks began slowly.

“They’ve communicated back?”

Levin interjected.

“We’ve communicated to our state partners our desire to do this work together,” Banks repeated to a smattering of laughter throughout the chamber.

A KATZ

A

mid the largest restructuring of city homeless services in decades, members of the city council’s Committee on General Welfare pressed Steven Banks, commissioner of the newly minted Department of Social Services, on the impact that his agency’s sweeping reforms will have on nonprofit providers.

Banks began his testimony by stressing the importance of contributions from nonprofits during the recently concluded 90-day review of homeless services, specifically citing client focus groups convened by the Coalition for the Homeless, Picture the Homeless and VOCAL. He also highlighted recommendations that directly resulted from dialogue with nonprofits, such as a push to rationalize shelter provider rates. Advocates, such as the Human Services Council, have repeatedly decried the city Department of Homeless Services’ current indirect cost rate of 8.5 percent. HSC, for example, claimed in written testimony on Thursday that actual overhead rates can be as high as 35 percent, citing a 2008 Bridgespan Group report.

Nonprofits have praised several other recommendations, including proposals to target services and rental assistance for clients with mental health needs cycling between jail and homelessness, to implement a capital repair program for shelters in poor condition and to create a more robust aftercare program for clients at risk of ending up in jail or psychiatric hospitals.

In addition to these programmatic shifts, Banks added that government partners must recognize the long history of underfunding that has contributed to the current state of affairs at many nonprofit-run shelters.

“If the roof couldn’t be fixed because we didn’t provide the funding and the ability to do it, that’s one thing. If there are conditions that built up for other reasons, that’s another thing,” Banks said.

Some council members suggested strategies for amplifying the voices of nonprofit service providers and homeless individuals as programmatic and structural changes are rolled out. For example, Councilman Stephen Levin, the committee’s chair, urged Banks to include representatives from community-based organizations and homeless advocacy groups on the soon-to-be created Interagency Homelessness Accountability Council, which will coordinate homeless services under the direction

15

Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

THREE ARRESTED AS DOI ASSAILS CLOSE TO HOME OVERSIGHT

By JEFF STEIN

DOI Commissioner Mark Peters at a New York City Council hearing.

T

he New York City Department of Investigation announced the arrest of one current and two former employees of a nonprofit-run home for juvenile offenders where, last June, three teenagers left undetected, escaped to an Internet cafe and raped a Brooklyn woman.

Andrew Best, Soraya Delancey and Stanley Stephens were arrested and charged with various misdemeanor counts, accused of falsifying security logbooks and failing to conduct required security checks.

Boys Town, the nonprofit provider that operated the facility, housed the three teenagers as a part of the city Administration of Children’s Services’ Close to Home program, which places juvenile offenders in city-contracted facilities near their home communities and provides them with more restorative social services like therapeutic treatment and specialized instruction. ACS terminated its Close to Home contract with Boys Town last July.

The employees’ arrests were announced in conjunction with the release of a DOI report that chronicles lax security measures and employee negligence at Boys Town’s “non-secure placement,” or NSP, facilities.

“This investigation showed a pervasive lack of oversight of city-contracted juvenile homes that resulted in a tragedy on June 1st of last year,” DOI Commissioner Mark Peters said in a statement. “The city and ACS have an obligation to safeguard both the public and the juveniles entrusted to their care, an obligation they failed to meet for several years.”

According to DOI, which reviewed hundreds of hours of security camera footage, night staff at the Boys Town facility routinely failed to conduct required bed checks and faithfully record them.

Instead, DOI said, night staff employees were often observed retir-

16

ing to unused bedrooms or reclining with pillows during their shifts.

The report states that in the month leading up to the June incident, Boys Town staff conducted only 15 percent of required checks. Even after the highly publicized incident, only 51 percent of required checks were conducted.

The report suggests that Boys Town’s negligence was not limited to the arrested employees; six additional employees failed to conduct required checks and made misleading entries in the nonprofit’s logbooks, according to the report. DOI’s video investigation also revealed 11 nights when staffers left the premises, in some cases leaving the youths unattended for periods ranging from a few minutes to over an hour.

The report also faults Boys Town management for failing to monitor video surveillance in real time – despite having the ability to do so – and for failing to address known alarm system vulnerabilities. Boys Town sites were also chronically understaffed and experienced frequent staff turnover, with 10 of the 21 budgeted night staff positions vacant for significant periods of time, according to ACS documents reviewed

by DOI. Several overnight staffers also told ACS that double shifts were commonplace at Boys Town.

Peters said that he did not know whether any of the arrested individuals had worked double shifts during the timeframe that DOI investigated.

Additionally, the DOI report contends that the wrongdoing at Boys Town is not an isolated phenomenon. “The safety deficiencies that ACS failed to detect at Boys Town are issues that exist throughout the Close to Home NSP program,” the report says, citing the fact that six out of nine nonprofit providers had, at some point during the past four years, been placed under heightened

ACS review due to safety concerns.

Peters said that he did not know how many city-contracted nonprofits were currently under some form of ACS review. According to ACS, the agency conducted site visits to all 27 non-secure placement sites between June and August 2015 to assess potential safety or security concerns and found no issues that necessitated a heightened review status. An ACS spokesperson said that three providers are currently under some form of review.

The DOI report also included a series of recommendations in response to ACS’ failings to prevent the Boys Town incident, which ACS has said it will adopt. The recommendations include creating a universal logbook for NSP sites, conducting regular unannounced site visits, more frequently auditing programs and more habitually monitoring video surveillance.

“As we got into this investigation, we found significant continuing safety issues, including failure to supervise and the lack of safety requirements of the NSP providers,” Peters told New York Nonprofit Media on Wednesday. “While ACS has taken a great many steps in the past few weeks to fix that, prior to a month ago, there were significant issues in both monitoring, supervision and requirements that are very much live issues.”

However, ACS contends that the agency has already made significant progress with regard to safety.

Between 2013 and 2015, for example, the number of AWOLs from NSP sites decreased by 69 percent,

Council of Family and Child Caring Agencies.

Nonprofit advocates also say that examples of wrongdoing by other providers listed in the DOI report are outdated and irrelevant. For example, the report cites “chronic AWOL concerns” at Queens locations run

by The Children’s Village, but those locations have not been in operation for years. The report also mentions safety concerns at sites run by New York Foundling and St. Vincent’s Services, providers that haven’t operated Close to Home NSP sites since 2013.

ACS also said that it had secured more funding to address safety concerns in the Close to Home program.

According to the agency, the de Blasio administration has added $4 million to the Close to Home budget, allowing the agency to hire 35 additional oversight positions.

But Peters insists that money alone cannot ensure safety at NSP sites.

“There were clearly issues that have nothing to do with budget,” Peters said. “For example, the failure to be reviewing the surveillance video, the failure to report on broken alarms, ACS’ failure to be properly supervising this, those are not budget issues.”

Peters also added that he did not think that additional paperwork and audit requirements would burden nonprofit and ACS staff. “If you are running a juvenile justice, law enforcement program, you need to run it in a way that keeps everyone safe.

That’s all there is to it,” Peters said.

But ACS cautioned against los-

"THE SAFETY DEFICIENCIES THAT ACS FAILED TO DETECT AT BOYS TOWN ARE ISSUES THAT EXIST THROUGHOUT THE CLOSE TO HOME NSP PROGRAM." according to an ACS representative.

Additionally, the representative said that many of the report’s recommendations, including the creation of updated monitoring mechanisms, have been integrated into agency policy for months.

“As they started their Close to Home programs, both ACS and the agencies themselves identified concerns and built in additional safety measures to protect youth, staff and the communities,” said Mary Jane Dessables, director of information, research and accountability at the

ing sight of the larger societal gains brought forth by the Close to Home program, despite early setbacks.

“Until recently, New York City's youth were shipped hundreds of miles from their homes and communities, which negatively impacted both the youth and the communities they returned to,” ACS said in a statement. “Close to Home is a massive transformation in the city's approach to juvenile justice and along with other juvenile justice reforms, has led to an all-time low youth crime rate.”

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

DOI RELEASES SECOND SCATHING REPORT ON ACS

By JEFF STEIN

THE DOI REPORT SUGGESTS THAT THE CASES ARE SYMPTOMS OF MUCH LARGER PROBLEMS AT ACS.

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he New York City Department of Investigation released its second report in under a month on policy and practice violations at the city Administration for Children’s Services on Tuesday.

And just like its previous report, which coincided with the arrest of three individuals who had worked at a nonprofit provider of ACS’ Close to Home program, DOI alleges “systematic concerns, including violations of law.”

The report focuses on three cases – two fatalities and one near-fatality – of children whose families were being investigated by ACS for allegations of child abuse and, in some cases, were receiving services from the agency and nonprofit providers when fateful incidents occurred.

One child, given the pseudonym Chris in the report, was the victim of serious physical abuse and food deprivation.

DOI claims that “ACS failed to timely and comprehensively complete all of its required investigative procedures while the parents’ abuse was escalating.” ACS took two months to interview fellow students, even though the agency requires child protective services caseworkers to conduct such interviews within seven days, the report states. DOI also says that caseworkers grossly overestimated Chris’ weight by 30 pounds and failed to obtain a medical expert and key medical documents that could have aided in obtaining a court order to remove Chris from his abusive home.

In another case, Morgan, a preschool-age child, died “under suspicious circumstances” while at the home of his mother, who had been investigated 11 times over 12 years for allegations of neglect, according to the report. The family’s previous interactions with ACS were troubling: The mother was shown to have exposed several of her children to cocaine in utero, and four of her eldest children spent more than a year in foster care, where they made numerous allegations of abuse and neglect against the younger children’s father.

Despite many years of services and interactions with the agency, Morgan died on “a day when, much like the previous allegations con-

NYNmedia.com

cerning this family, the mother was not supervising her children and the father of the younger children was not home,” the DOI report states.

In the final case, Alex, also a preschool-age child, was beaten to death by his mother, who had been investigated by ACS 13 times over the past 12 years due to allegations of drug abuse and excessive corporal punishment of her seven children, according to the report.

After spending time in foster care, Alex, along with other siblings, was “trial discharged” back to his mother, despite her admitting to recent drug use, failing to visit her children while they were in foster care and other “barriers to reunification,” the report states. A year later, and after two more “unfounded” investigations into allegations of abuse, Alex was beaten and killed.

In addition to detailing the three tragic cases, the DOI report suggests that the cases are symptoms of much larger problems at ACS. Specifically, the report cited ACS data showing that “16 percent of children who ACS determined were abused or neglected, were subsequently abused or neglected again within a one-year period,” failing to meet the state’s 7 percent target. The report also raised concerns about ACS’ timeliness in filing petitions to terminate parental rights, which must be filed if a child has been in foster care for 17 of the last 22 months, barring some “compelling reason” not to file; in 82 percent of such cases, ACS did not immediately file a petition to terminate parental rights.

“ACS is the first line of defense for the defenseless,” DOI Commissioner Mark Peters said in a statement.

“DOI’s investigation found that on several occasions ACS and its provider agencies failed to take necessary steps to protect children and at times may actually have put them in harm’s way.”

However, ACS cautioned against extrapolating too much from just a handful of cases.

“I think there are certainly case practice improvements that ACS can make with respect to these three cases, but these are three specific cases – some of which had terrible, terrible consequences – out of over at least 55,000 that we see every year,” said

Jill Krauss, an agency spokeswoman.

“I would not say that they are representative.”

In addition to contesting the larger thrust of the report – that the three cases are representative of systematic failures – ACS and other child welfare professionals pushed back on some of the report’s specifics.

One point of contention was the report’s usage of the 16 percent repeat maltreatment rate, which Krauss argued lacked appropriate context.

“While the state’s aspirational goal may be 7 percent – to be sure, any repeat maltreatment is a problem – but the counties of New York City consistently have the lowest repeat maltreatment rate of the entire state,” Krauss said, citing a state Office of Child and Family Services chart that shows all jurisdictions outside of the city with higher rates of repeat maltreatment, many of which are above 30 percent. “I think that’s an instance where the DOI chose to tell a story in a pretty negative light when our data is actually relatively strong.”

Other child welfare advocates called into question the accuracy of repeat maltreatment data generally.

“In our experience, children grow to trust their preventive or foster care worker and will disclose abuse that happened weeks or months before the latest ACS investigation,” said Mary Jane Dessables, director of research, information and accountability for the Council of Family and Child Caring Agencies, which advocates on behalf of child welfare nonprofits. “Later, when ACS issues outcomes data to each agency as part of their annual assessment, agencies find some of these cases in the data, based on the indication date and not the date the maltreatment occurred.

In these cases, it’s not subsequent maltreatment but more information of prior maltreatment.”

But Peters emphatically denied any inaccuracies in the data point.

“These numbers are re-abused numbers,” Peters said. “You can try to slice them any way that you want, but the bottom line is in 16 percent of cases where ACS determined the child has been abused or neglected, they’ve been re-abused or neglected within a year. And that number has not gone down over the past four years, and it’s twice what the state says is an acceptable level.”

ACS, and other child welfare advocates, also called into question DOI’s emphasis on ACS’ role in the process to terminate parental rights when, in practice, much of the system is dominated by family court judges and attorneys.

“It is important to know that New York has some of the strongest attorneys representing parents and children who may not necessarily want termination, so they could be fighting it in court for some time,” Krauss said. “When you litigate something, it is protracted. It is not just an ACS unilateral decision to make.”

Krauss specifically called into question DOI’s claim that ACS fails to file timely petitions to terminate parental rights, given that family courts have largely endorsed the agency’s efforts.

“In 97.6 percent of our 2015 cases, a family court made the determination that ACS made a reasonable effort to achieve permanency, based on all of the facts and circumstances of a case,” Krauss said, adding that the federal statute that DOI cites includes hundreds of exceptions to the firm 22-month timeline. “(The family court rate) is probably a more accurate measure than the 17 out of 22 months rule, only because that rule has so many exceptions to it that it’s not actually measuring what happens in specific cases.”

However, Peters stuck by DOI’s measure and called into question the accuracy of family court statistics.

“I do not have – ACS has not provided to me or to anybody else – all of the family court records to demonstrate (the accuracy of family court’s assessment),” Peters said.

Despite these points of disagreement, ACS largely accepted DOI’s recommendations, including a new system to avoid conflicts of interest for caseworkers investigating cases to which they had been previously assigned, as well as improving information collection systems and creating more robust oversight mechanisms.

ACS also said that, since the tragedies in 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio has added $100 million to strengthen the child welfare system, including hiring 700 new staff, increasing training and reducing caseloads to record lows. Krauss also touted a recent ACS initiative called No Time To Wait which works to streamline reunification and adoption processes and has already increased efficiency in adoption subsidy approvals by over 50 percent.

Notwithstanding these criticisms, Krauss said that she hopes that city agencies will strive for comprehensive services for families touched by the child welfare system.

“A lot of the problems that can bring families to our attention are huge systemic problems around poverty, homelessness, a lack of education and a lack of resources and supports for families that are really struggling,” Krauss said.

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

BREAKING THE CHAIN Programs provide resources, representation for ‘chained’ Jewish women

By JEFF STEIN

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ast December, Mendel Epstein, an Orthodox Jewish rabbi in Brooklyn, was convicted of conspiring to kidnap and torture men who had refused to give their wives a Jewish divorce, known as a “get.” The case – which was investigated by the FBI and resulted in a 10-year prison sentence for Epstein – generated sensational tabloid and national media coverage. (The Daily News nicknamed Epstein “The Prodfather,” for his alleged use of a cattle prod to coerce husbands to provide a divorce.)

But lost amid the macabre details of the Epstein case was a much more widespread problem that persists in the tight-knit Orthodox communities in Williamsburg, Crown Heights, Borough Park and Flatbush: Many Orthodox Jewish

women seeking to escape abusive or defunct marriages face a system that is stacked against them, sometimes trapping them as “chained women” for years on end. And as such cases have become increasingly prevalent, advocates, social services agencies and lawyers have teamed up in an effort to provide women with the resources and representation that they need.

At the core of the Jewish divorce system is the get, a divorce document that can only be provided by a husband to his wife in a Jewish court, a forum which arbitrates matrimony matters under religious law. In the case that a husband continually refuses to grant the get, despite his marriage being defunct, his wife is said to be “agunah,” or chained to him, unable to pursue

remarriage or bear legitimate children within the Orthodox Jewish community.

While many Jewish scholars say that a get should never be refused once a marriage is functionally over, advocates say that, in many cases, husbands will use the get as a way to gain the upper hand in a divorce.

“Husbands will refuse the get and use it as a form of blackmail to extort concessions,” said Orly Kusher, staff attorney at Sanctuary for Families’ Orthodox Jewish Matrimonial Project, which recently launched due to an influx of get refusal cases. “They’ll say, ‘I won’t give you the Jewish divorce unless you give me custody of the kids, or a large sum of money – give me $30,000 and then I’ll give you the get.’ Our view here at Sanctuary – and why it ties

in with our work with domestic violence victims – is that we see the refusal to give a get, in and of itself, as a form of abuse.”

According to social service workers, fear over the refusal of the get is just one of a host of conditions that can lead Orthodox women to stay in abusive relationships.

“The idea of ‘shalom bayit,’ or peace in the home, is a central tenet of Jewish marriage,” said Shoshannah Frydman, director of family violence services at the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty. “Women are socialized to be mothers and homemakers, so speaking up about an abusive relationship can be seen within the community as a personal failing to uphold that peace.”

Due to the stigma attached to divorce and domestic abuse issues,

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NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9

DYLAN

FORS-

MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

MANY MEMBERS OF THE COMMUNITY HAVE AN ALLERGY TO ANYTHING THAT HAS TO DO WITH FEMINISM BECAUSE THAT IS SEEN AS GOING AGAINST THE CONCEPT OF THE FAMILY. Frydman says that many women fear that escaping an abusive relationship will hurt their children’s chances of finding a suitable partner during the “shidduch,” or matchmaking process that arranges marriages within the community.

“Some women will only contact us about abuse when their last child gets married off,” Frydman said.

“One of our clients has two daughters who are in their 20s and are unmarried. They are begging their mother to stay in her marriage because they are afraid it will hurt their chances. But they understand why she wants to leave.”

Frydman also says that Orthodox women feel incredible societal and religious pressure to keep their families intact.

“Who will say kiddush (a Jewish prayer) over the wine? That’s seen as a male role,” Frydman said.

“What is it like to have a Passover seder without a family? And then there are the very harsh financial realities: kosher food costs more; entering the workforce and supporting themselves and their children apart from their husbands is often extremely challenging, especially because these are often large families.”

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Given these forces, Kusher says that it is important for women to have legal support early on in the matrimony process, which gives them the strongest chance of navigating the system successfully. In response to this need, the Orthodox Jewish Matrimony Project, which Kusher heads, provides representation for Orthodox women in divorce, custody, visitation and child support hearings in both civil and Jewish courts, as well as connects clients to in-house counseling, shelter and job training services.

“Ideally, we want to have the client to come to us before she’s already been refused a get,” Kusher said. “Let’s say she’s just thinking of getting a divorce. She’s in an abusive situation. Hopefully we can contact that client early, because if we are representing her from the beginning, we can give her the best advice and counsel for her case, as opposed to if she already tried to go to a certain Jewish court and maybe things already happened in that court and she’s bound to a certain forum, we would still advocate for her, but we can’t necessarily undo things that have already been done.”

Rabbi Shlomo Weissmann, who

presides over matrimony proceedings at the Beth Din of America, a forum favored by advocates due to its more sympathetic treatment of women than other, more conservative Jewish courts, says that it’s important for women to be guided through the process by experts.

“I think that legal representation is a prudent thing to have, especially when we are arbitrating not just the get, but also child custody and financial disputes,” Weissmann said.

“I would say that often women do not have a lawyer with them.”

Weissmann also says that Jewish courts need to be compassionate when women come before them.

“Our Beth Din is very cognizant of the human side of this,” Weissmann said. “There is a person who is suffering, and it requires a huge amount of sensitivities, especially with agunot. We always make sure that our decisions are based on the best interests of children and the economic realities of both members of the couple. Women need to be treated fairly in the outcome of financial disputes.”

The Beth Din of America, along with women’s lawyers and social services workers, also advocates that all Jewish couples sign a

“halachic” (Jewish law) prenuptial agreement that they say successfully resolves the vast majority of matrimonial disputes. The agreement, which is also available as a postnuptial, is based on the obligation under Jewish law for a husband to provide food, clothing and shelter to his wife. It stipulates that if the husband refuses to give his wife a get, he will be forced to pay his wife an annual allowance, currently set at $54,750, which is enforceable in civil court. The agreement also specifies at the outset which Jewish court will decide matrimony matters in the case of a divorce.

“I want to stress the vital importance of the prenup,” Weissmann said. “If a woman has signed a halachic prenup, that document provides a clear framework for the resolution for the issue. In fact, I now know many rabbis who will not marry a couple unless they have signed the agreement.”

However, advocates say that some of the more conservative Orthodox communities, such as the community in Williamsburg, have been slow to adopt this practice.

“They are very focused on tradition and they see that as their strength,” said Keshet Starr, director of advocacy and legal strategy at the Organization for the Resolution of Agunot. “If something is seen as anti-traditional, there will be a push against it. Many members of the community have an allergy to anything that has to do with feminism because that is seen as going against the concept of the family.”

Given this pushback, Starr stresses the importance of outreach to tight-knit communities to educate women about domestic abuse and the resources that are available.

“The more insular the community, the harder it is to educate people about domestic violence,” Starr said. “There has been a lot of growth, but it’s been hard for some to recognize that it’s not just about physical abuse. In many cases, a woman wouldn’t even know to put a label on her situation because she doesn’t have that language.”

Starr also highlighted the importance of cultural competence for social workers and lawyers who are providing services to Orthodox women.

“Having places to go to where people understand you culturally is very important,” Starr said.

“Sometimes if you’re going for help outside the community, you feel like you can’t share everything because outsiders will think that the community is bad. You have to go to people who know the community from the inside.”

That’s where Kusher, and her expertise in both civil and Jewish court, come in.

“I really feel honored that I can serve my community,” Kusher said.

“I am a Jewish woman, and I’m so grateful to Sanctuary for recognizing that there should be somebody who can focus on the community in a deeper way. We can understand where clients are coming from, not just as victims, but as members of the Jewish community.”

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

NEWS

WHY NONPROFITS SHOULD BE PREPARED FOR THE WORST A Q&A with John MacIntosh of SeaChange Capital Partners and Dylan Roberts of Oliver Wyman

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pertise on risk management and very little knowledge on the nonprofit industry. And we put those two things together.

NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA: WHY DID YOU TEAM UP FOR THIS REPORT? John MacIntosh: There are a number of nonprofit failures that have made the press: FEGS, New York City Opera, the challenges at Cooper Union. A number of people called us to say, “Can you help us with risk? What can we do better?” And we felt there really wasn’t a lot that had been written about that and that we could add something to it.

Dylan Roberts: John and SeaChange came with a lot of expertise on the nonprofit industry. We came with ex-

NYN: WHAT WERE SOME OF THE MOST REMARKABLE FINDINGS? JM: One would be that the sector is very fragile: Something like 10 percent of the not-for-profits are insolvent, their liabilities exceed their assets; that 40 to 50 percent have, in effect, no margin for error – one hiccup and they could be really in trouble; and maybe 30 percent look to be financially strong. I think the (Medicaid reform) movement to value-based payments is putting enormous strains on the health and human service sector. I think in some cases, minimum wage moving up to $15 an hour, which is wonderful, could be a problem unless government makes sure that the contracts are adjusted. And the third thing – which we can’t prove but I think we heard anecdotally – is perhaps, quite rationally, the banks seem to be getting tougher in cutting back on the

hortly after they released “Risk Management for Nonprofits,” two of the report’s authors, John MacIntosh of SeaChange Capital and Dylan Roberts of Oliver Wyman consulting, spoke with Contributing Editor Jeff Stein about the financial dangers nonprofits face and how they should prepare themselves for the unexpected. This interview has been edited for content and clarity. Watch the full interview at nynmedia.com.

lines of credit and the credit available to the sector.

have you. What’s the plan? Let’s think about it now, rather than wait.

NYN: WHAT WERE SOME OF THE WORST PRACTICES YOU OBSERVED? DR: Most donors to the nonprofit industry, most contracts that send revenue to the nonprofit industry, require that all of that money actually be spent on programs. Which obviously is wonderful, because people want to make sure their dollars are spent on the programs they’re supporting, but as a consequence of all the money being spent on programs and not set aside, there really is no cushion or margin for error in the nonprofit industry. We observed lots of nonprofits that had financial weaknesses and financial troubles, but really didn’t even have the financial measures or the reporting systems in place to identify that.

JM: And the risk could be that you can’t renew your lease in the building where you both have your headquarters and you do your program. Or that your very charismatic executive director leaves or gets hit by a bus, what

NYN: WHAT ABOUT GROUPS WHO SAY THAT SCENARIO PLANNING COULD COST TOO MUCH MONEY? JM: I think there are some things that you can do and some things that maybe you can’t. And we were careful in the report not to say you have to do all these things or it’s a mistake, but these should all be considered.

NYN: WHAT COULD CITY GOVERNMENT DO TO EASE BURDENS OR MAKE PROCUREMENT POLICY MORE SENSIBLE? JM: These groups that have no margin for error, really government contracts are the oxygen they need to live. Basically the government is borrowing from these groups and they should borrow less by paying earlier, they should pay interest on the delayed payments and they should work to create some sort of facility to help groups fund themselves while they’re waiting to get paid.

ADDRESSING HOMELESSNESS A Q&A on supportive housing with the Jericho Project’s Tori Lyon

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hortly after being named the first chief executive officer of the Jericho Project, which works to end homelessness at its roots, Tori Lyon talked with our editor-at-large about her organization’s work, her role on de Blasio’s supportive housing task force and helping her clients achieve financial stability. This interview has been edited for content and clarity. For more on Lyon’s leadership style and Jericho Projects’ new initiative serving LGBT young adults, watch the full interview at nynmedia.com.

NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA: YOU’VE BEEN APPOINTED TO MAY-

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OR BILL DE BLASIO’S SUPPORTIVE HOUSING TASK FORCE ALONG WITH MANY OTHER NONPROFITS. WHAT DOES JERICHO PROJECT BRING TO THE TABLE? Tori Lyon: I was part of the campaign to really advocate for 15,000 new units of supportive housing in New York City, and we got exactly what we asked for. It’s a lot of us who’ve been in the field for a while.

I think Jericho brings a unique perspective because we really focus a lot on veterans, and I think that’s a piece that is obviously very important to the city and to the mayor. We also are a little bit different from other supportive housing providers in that we have a real focus on finding our folks employment and helping them attain education and eventually, when they don’t need supportive housing, moving on from our housing into independent affordable housing in the community.

NYN: WHAT ARE SOME OF THE IMMEDIATE GOALS OF THE TASK FORCE? TL: We had one meeting so far at City Hall and we’ve broken up into smaller work groups, into four different areas. I’m going to be on the

workgroup that’s going to be talking about different service models. In supportive housing there’s not one size fits all. So the workgroup that I’m on is going to think about how would a service model look different for a young adult as opposed to somebody who has a severe psychiatric disability. Or how would it look in different parts of the city, or for different sizes.

We’re on a pretty quick timeline, so I think they want to have these units out on the streets within six months with our recommendations and with probably a request for proposals.

NYN: HOW DO YOU FIND PEOPLE JOBS IN THIS CITY’S ECONOMIC CLIMATE? TL: I’m lucky to have some really amazing colleagues who work on our workforce opportunities program.

We also have employment specialists who are the ones who are going out and meeting with employers and saying, “We can provide you with pre-qualified candidates that we’ve already screened.” And that actually is very attractive to employers, because if you just get a resume unsolicited, you don’t really know who you’re getting and so Jericho is able to vet them, and we’ve been able to

establish wonderful relationships with some employers. We made almost 200 jobs placements last year and the average starting salary was almost $13 an hour.

NYN: IN WHAT SECTORS ARE YOU FINDING JOB PLACEMENTS? TL: So there’s a lot of security, food service, retail, and we actually have a couple of manufacturing companies in the Bronx that we work with, and those tend to be good, stable jobs.

NYN: WHAT HELPS MAKE THIS MODEL EFFECTIVE? TL: Study after study – not just here in New York but all across the country, and I think even some in Canada – have shown that supportive housing saves significant taxpayer dollars. So we’re able to stop that cycle of going from homelessness to a psychiatric hospital to jail to inpatient treatment and to detox. To break that cycle, it just takes a lot of compassion and services. Once somebody has a stable apartment, and they have a lease and they have a key to their own place, they’re willing to work on some of the underlying issues that cause them to have this horrible cycle.

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

SPOTLIGHT: HEALTHCARE

SAGE HELPS LGBT SENIORS MANAGE CHRONIC DISEASE

JASPER BRIGGS

By ALICE POPOVICI

SAGE participant Nora-Ann Thompson

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hen Nora-Ann Thompson, 66, learned about a new chronic disease management program at the SAGE (Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders) center where she regularly participates in activities, in Harlem, she thought she was going to receive the same advice she’s heard before: quit smoking and lose weight.

But Thompson, a retired nurse who suffers from chronic conditions including back problems, obesity, arthritis, diabetes and depression, said she was pleasantly surprised after signing up for the six-week program that ended in January. After implementing new eating habits and other health tips into her daily routine, Thompson, who also attends Zumba, meditation and African dance classes at the SAGE center in Harlem, said she is beginning to see some improvements in her health.

During Thompson’s last doctor’s visit, she learned that her diabetes number has improved slightly, and her blood pressure has been stable.

“This (program) gave you real alternatives, and how to make a plan and follow a plan,” Thompson said.

The Chronic-Disease Self-Management program Thompson attended at SAGE, the largest organization serving the New York City area’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender older adults, was fundNYNmedia.com

able,” such as gradually eliminating nighttime snacks, and to add more vegetables to her meals.

The $100,000 grant was renewed again this year, this time with a focus on providing mental health services. Half of this year’s grant will be used to develop training programs to help SAGE staff manage the growing number of participants with mental illness, Thurston said. As with the previous grant, the other half is being used to fund self-care management programs that SAGE has run on an ongoing basis with previous funding from NYCT. SAGE, founded in 1978, has a budget of about $10 million for the upcoming fiscal year, and serves about 3,500 registered participants at its five New York City locations. More than 75 percent of the organization’s participants live on fixed incomes.

“We were getting a lot of people who were very severely and persistently mentally ill,” Thurston said, describing the motivation for developing a mental health training program. The organization had

experienced a number of incidents which she called “explosive situations.” Thurston said no one was injured, but the organization recognized the need to train staff to safely address similar issues in the future.

As a population that has experienced “a lifetime of being excluded,” many LGBT seniors are dealing with the consequences of having had inconsistent work histories and as a result, poor insurance coverage, said Rachel Pardoe, program officer at the New York Community Trust.

“They’re often isolated, and because of the isolation, it creates negative health outcomes.”

SAGE works to help them overcome that isolation, Hall said.

“It’s re-establishing support, but then it’s also teaching people how they can be better support systems for people around them,” Hall said.

For many LGBT seniors, who have lost touch with family for a variety of reasons, “your friends often become your support system – they become your family.”

ed with half of a $100,000 grant the nonprofit received in 2015 from the New York Community Trust. The program was part of the organization’s push to make evidence-based health training available to participants in the Harlem, Brooklyn and Bronx locations it has expanded and opened within the last year and a half.

“One of the goals was to have LGBT older people learn to manage their health care,” said Catherine Thurston, chief services officer at the organization. The two six-weekprograms served 33 individuals and were conducted this spring; 75 percent of those who started the program completed it.

Porsha Hall, health and wellness manager at SAGE, said the fact that LGBT seniors experience isolation was one of the main incentives for creating two self-care management programs funded by the 2015 grant: a Chronic Disease Self-Management Program and a Diabetes Self-Management Program.

Thompson said that the chronic disease self-care management program helped her find practical ways to manage a few of her chronic conditions. She learned helpful techniques to deal with anxiety, such as breathing deeply, meditating and using music to relax. To manage her weight, she learned how to make a plan that is “measurable and do-

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

SPOTLIGHT: HEALTHCARE

LGBT HEALTH CARE NONPROFITS FORESEE DSRIP PROBLEMS AMID SUCCESS

ORIEL PE’ER

By FR ANK G. RU N YEON

Apicha primarily serves Asians and Pacific Islanders, the LGBT community and individuals living with and affected by HIV/ AIDS, and has been adding 100 new patients a week.

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illions of dollars in grant money for expansion projects and fresh program funding has rolled in from the city, state and several programs for providers specializing in LGBT patient care in New York. Callen-Lorde will open two new health centers and Apicha is renovating and expanding its main site even as it opens another health center in Jackson Heights.

But executives at both organizations and others providing LGBT services say the funds don’t address deeper problems with Medicaid reimbursement that could shutter specialized nonprofit health care providers in the future.

“It doesn't threaten my existence tomorrow, but I'm worried about three years from now,” said Wendy Stark, executive director of Callen-Lorde Community Health Center, New York City’s largest LGBT-focused health care nonprofit.

The problems posed by this new Medicaid system are complex, nuanced, and admittedly arcane, health care nonprofits and Delivery System Reform Incentive Payment (DSRIP)-involved health care professionals said. This complexity masks potentially ruinous outcomes, they said, even if health care nonprofits are not suffering any acute pain at the moment.

LGBT health care providers are worried that if allowances are not made in the reimbursement procedures for smaller health care organi-

22

zations like theirs, in the near future, doctors may become hamstrung by bureaucracy and already-vulnerable patients will suffer.

These problems do not only impact LGBT health care providers, community health care nonprofits say.

They are ingrained issues that impact many other community-based organizations as well. However, the complications are likely to be most acutely felt by smaller health care providers that serve targeted populations with specific needs.

The DSRIP program is an immense project to overhaul Medicaid in New York. Broadly, DSRIP’s goal is to create a collaborative network of health care providers serving the poor who will stop competing with one another and instead work together to cre-

imburses them according to patient health outcomes – more money for healthier patients and less money for unhealthier patients.

Most nonprofits agree that the LGBT population faces a daunting set of health care challenges, and research supports this. If Medicaid’s “value-based payment” model does not account for providers specializing in serving such groups, those providers are bound to suffer from underfunding.

“If you are serving a population that is very difficult, that requires a lot of support services, our concern is that whatever the value-based payment is, it's got to be able to capture the appropriate amount of money that's required to serve that patient,” said Gertrudes Pajaron, chief de-

ers, nonprofits say. In fact, research shows that continued discrimination and insensitive care by medical professionals unfamiliar with the particular needs of this community have made some LGBT people less likely to go to a doctor at all. Still, LGBT health care nonprofits only serve a fraction of the overall estimated LGBT population in New York.

According to a 2013 analysis by the Williams Institute, there are over 580,000 LGBT adults in the state. Two principal nonprofit providers that target this community in New York, Callen-Lorde and Apicha, only serve an estimated 17,000 and 4,400 patients each, respectively – roughly 3 percent of the LGBT population.

As a result, both organizations say that they have an overwhelming demand for their services. Callen-Lorde has to turn away roughly 20 patients a day because it doesn’t yet have the physical capacity to serve them all.

Apicha, meanwhile, has been adding 100 new patients a week, counting on incoming grant money and upcoming expansion plans to meet the need.

"Part of the reason patients come to Callen-Lorde and don't go to a larger institution, a more mainstream institution, is because they trust us.

They want to go to a place with a specific mission because they've had bad experiences elsewhere.”

Stark said that she knows LGBT patients who, even in the midst of a medical emergency, “refuse to go to an emergency room for fear of the kind of treatment they might experience there.”

The vast majority of LGBT people seeking medical care will inevitably be served by physicians who are not LGBT-specialized, however the New York State Department of Health is

“IT DOESN’T THREATEN MY EXISTENCE TOMORROW, BUT I’M WORRIED ABOUT THREE YEARS FROM NOW.” ate better health outcomes for patients – all while reducing wasteful spending. To promote this, Medicaid will move away from a system that reimburses hospitals and health care providers for the total services rendered and toward a system that re-

velopment officer at Apicha, which primarily serves Asians and Pacific Islanders, the LGBT community and individuals living with and affected

by HIV/AIDS. LGBT patients generally prefer specialized LGBT health care provid-

requiring that the medical community increase its “cultural competency” – a watchword for LGBT-sensitive health care services.

The most common issue facing DSRIP-involved LGBT health care providers is that the patient populaNYNmedia.com

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tions they serve are geographically dispersed – a fact that puts them at a disadvantage to collect Medicare reimbursements, providers say.

“Our patients come to us from all five boroughs and beyond,” Stark said, noting that nearly 10 percent of the patients Callen-Lorde serves come from out of state. “And so, we don't have a bulk of patients attributed to one particular DSRIP network, which means that we get less money. And that has everything to do, I'd say, with us being an LGBT-focused health care center,” she said.

Another issue Stark points to is the smaller size of LGBT health care providers. Nonprofits like hers have far fewer staff members to deal with the additional administrative burden the DSRIP rollout requires of all health care providers.

The overhaul of Medicaid has sent a flood of paperwork to health care providers’ desks and blocked out tens of hours a month on senior staffers’ calendars for meetings to coordinate the rollout of the reforms. Health care executives said these burdens weigh heavily on nonprofit community health organizations, which run leaner operations with far fewer administrative staff members to do the extra work.

Apicha, a smaller health care nonprofit whose primary care patient base is 70 percent LGBT, estimates senior staff spend about 20 hours a month in DSRIP meetings.

"It is a lot,” said Phillip Miner, director of grants and communications at Apicha. However, the extra work comes with a silver lining. "Because we are the small guy, it allows us to be in the room with the big guy. That's what we've focused on as the benefit for the moment,” he said. "That's how we justify it."

Apicha has also been the beneficiary of millions of dollars in grant and award money that has allowed it to expand and increase patient caseloads even as administrative demands from DSRIP increase.

The organization has found the state to be responsive to their concerns – to the tune of a $6 million Vital Access Program award it received in 2014 to build up its financial and operational capacity.

“If the grants that they gave us were to be used as a measure of that, yes, NYNmedia.com

STARK SAID THAT SHE KNOWS LGBT PATIENTS WHO, EVEN IN THE MIDST OF A MEDICAL EMERGENCY, “REFUSE TO GO TO AN EMERGENCY ROOM FOR FEAR OF THE KIND OF TREATMENT THEY MIGHT EXPERIENCE THERE.” it looks like they are hearing what we are telling them,” said Pajaron.

But concerns about the future remain.

“All I know is that the money for reimbursement will go down, rather than go up. That seems to be the trend,” said Pajaron, who carefully couched her concerns in optimism.

“But we're not there yet.”

“An incredible time suck is necessary to make this work,” said Bob Hayes, president and CEO of Community Healthcare Network, a nonprofit that runs a number of LGBT-specific programs at its 11 health centers, serving 75,000 patients in New York City. Hayes added wryly, “It could be useful to do things … like see patients.”

“As the CEO here, I've said, ‘Take it easy. We can't be at every meeting they call,’” Hayes said. “The hospitals have armies of administrators. We don’t. And I can't afford to have my doctors going to these meetings and not seeing patients.”

A senior member of the DSRIP Mount Sinai Performing Provider System (PPS), one of four local planning and DSRIP implementation committees for Manhattan, spoke with New York Nonprofit Media on the condition that he not be quoted.

He said the local DSRIP machinery works hard to accommodate LGBT and other niche health care providers, but that the state health department has been inflexible in how it structures the Medicaid reimbursement.

Hayes, however, lays the blame on large hospitals and academic medical institutions, like Mount Sinai, that are at the helm of local DSRIP PPSs. “The state has opened up the flow

of dollars, but the bureaucratic leadership of the PPS is moving like a glacier in getting funds to the community,” said Hayes.

Is this “going to sabotage an efficient health delivery reform? Absolutely. Of course this will sabotage it,” Hayes said. “I do think that the Cuomo administration has to step up and begin to put a bit more assertive pressure on the academic medical institutions."

“Without those funds, health reform is not going to happen in New York,” he added.

Charles King, president and CEO of Housing Works, would argue that special considerations should be made for community-based organizations to help insure the specific needs of target populations are addressed.

"Here's what I would say. This is not a problem of LGBT (health care providers), this is a problem of community-based organizations, which might have a disparate impact on LGBT-specific organizations,” King said.

King aims to build an accountable

care organization that would cater to the unique challenges facing LGBT health care providers. While the launch is planned in the next two months, he declined to name which organizations will be participating.

“We have been very strong proponents of … creating a single, statewide, accountable care organization under the value-based payment model. It would take responsibility for lives statewide of people living with HIV, MSM (men who have sex with men), transgender, people who inject drugs, and negative partners in HIV discordant relationships,” King said.

He hopes an organization where smaller, similar health care providers can cooperate could give them more influence.

"The idea is that every provider within the system would have an ownership stake,” King said. “It will actually put folks who serve certainly the MSM and transgender population in a preferred place in the whole structure.”

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SPOTLIGHT: HEALTHCARE

FAILING HEALTH Reports of neglect at top nursing home point to failures in state oversight

PHOTOS OF HEBREW HOME AND ENVIRONS: FRANK RUNYEON

By FR ANK G. RU N YEON

N

estled among stately colonial houses and hemmed in by rambling stone walls, the Hebrew Home at Riverdale sits on 32 acres of well-manicured land in the tony Bronx neighborhood of North Riverdale. The nonprofit nursing home holds a coveted five-star rating from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and wins perennial mentions in U.S. News and World Report’s list of best nursing homes.

But this idyllic campus is the subject of worrying reports from former residents who say they were neglected and suffered under Hebrew Home doctors and nurses who failed to provide adequate care. City & State examined dozens of lawsuits brought against the nursing home as well as other reports of neglect from former residents, their family members and lawyers.

Since 2010, over two-dozen lawsuits were filed against Hebrew Home alleging medical malpractice or neglect that led to serious injuries or wrongful death – a red flag that may call into question its lofty rating.

Hebrew Home declined repeated interview requests from City & State.

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When asked to explain the allegations of neglect, the nursing home responded in a statement: “We cannot and will not comment on litigation in which the Hebrew Home is a party.” The statement also noted that Hebrew Home has a resident council where complaints are discussed and that administrators do “respond directly to any and all resident and family concerns that warrant attention at that level.”

“The Hebrew Home at Riverdale is proud of its near century history of providing the highest quality of care and compassion to countless older adults and their families,” the statement read.

City & State identified and reviewed 26 lawsuits against Hebrew Home.

Most of them are ongoing. Six have been settled – most for undisclosed sums. Just one case was dismissed based on the evidence.

City & State did find that two other large nursing homes in the Bronx had similarly high numbers of neglect lawsuits, but resident advocates and industry representatives differ on what that might indicate. Industry representatives see elder abuse

attorneys attacking an easy target in a litigation-friendly borough, while resident advocates see a sign of a systemic problem with neglect.

Industry experts, advocates, and lawyers interviewed by City & State said Hebrew Home may still be one of the best nursing homes in the state – but considering the quality of nursing home care in New York, bad things can happen even at the best facilities. Ultimately, they said, the numerous reports of neglect and abuse at Hebrew Home are an indication of failed state oversight.

“What we're seeing is that even in a supposedly good nursing home the care is generally not very good,” said Richard Mollot, executive director of the Long Term Care Community Coalition (LTCCC), a leading advocacy group for nursing home residents. “I think it's very significant.”

What’s more, inconsistencies between reports of neglect and official CMS star ratings, as seen at Hebrew Home, undermine the credibility of the nursing home ratings system, advocates argued.

Living in a nursing home “that is purportedly a five-star facility

doesn't mean that you are necessarily safe,” Mollot said. "It's possible to have significant problems and still be highly rated, because of the problems in oversight and monitoring.”

Reports of abuse and neglect in New York nursing homes have spiked over the last few years, as understaffed regulators struggle to function effectively. As City & State previously reported, the quality of New York nursing home care ranks among the worst in the nation, with the state attorney general’s office indicating that the state needs more manpower to police the problem.

A recent state comptroller report noted short-staffing at the state Department of Health as a serious issue that led to delays of up to six years in fining nursing homes for violations after investigators identified problems. The state Health Department, which acts as the primary regulator of nursing homes, said the problems were being addressed.

But other research suggests that health officials often fail to identify violations even when they are looking for them.

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“In recent years we've seen a significant decrease in the state holding nursing homes accountable,” Mollot said. “I would say we have widespread failure to meet or exceed the minimum standards.”

The state Health Department has laws and enforcement methods at its disposal that allow it to crack down on nursing homes that are abusing or neglecting their residents. But advocates complain that the department has not taken full advantage of these tools.

The LTCCC issued a report last year noting that the state Health Depart-

agencies were given a powerful tool to carry out their respective mandates to hold providers accountable for protecting residents, which they chose to ignore in favor of activities that were much more amenable to the (nursing home) industry,” said Mollot.

“It is infuriating and heartbreaking,” he said.

The state Department of Health is the principal regulatory oversight agency in New York, but the federally mandated Long Term Care Ombudsman program also plays a role

ly cites nursing homes and is slow to fine them, and an ombudsman program that is poorly funded, understaffed, and has largely stopped reporting complaints, nursing home residents and their families told City & State they feel they have no other recourse but to file a lawsuit.

Now, even that avenue may be closing.

Many nursing homes include forced arbitration clauses in their admission agreements, in which residents waive their right to a trial when they sign the paperwork admitting them to the facility. Any future

"WE HAVE 9,000 PEOPLE IN NEW YORK NURSING HOMES THAT HAVE PRESSURE ULCERS. THAT IS INSANE." ment rarely cites nursing homes for pressure ulcers. At the same time, the report found that nearly 9 percent of nursing home residents have a pressure ulcer. The sores are a commonly used measure of neglect in nursing homes because they are easily preventable with proper care. In other words, the wounds are an observable indicator of neglect.

"We have 9,000 people in New York nursing homes that have pressure ulcers," Mollot said. “That is insane.”

The report also found that the state Health Department rarely cites nursing homes for staffing shortages, even though New York is recognized as having low staffing rates. On average, the department issued just 13 citations for insufficient nursing staff each year to the over 600 nursing homes in the state, according to the report.

In 2005, the LTCCC reported that federal inspectors identified more than four times as many health violations as New York state inspectors did in the same nursing homes.

Still, the state Health Department stressed they have a thorough process to investigate complaints. When it finds deficiencies, nursing homes are given citations and fines.

“DOH is committed to protecting the health and safety of New York’s nursing home residents,” an agency representative said. “Whether or not there is abuse or neglect, any time a facility violates a regulation it must submit a plan of correction that is acceptable to the department and correct the deficient practice. All complaints and incidents received about nursing homes are reviewed by the department through the Centralized Complaint Intake Unit with appropriate action taken. In cases where the department determines a nursing home violates regulation, the department will issue a citation to the nursing home.”

For advocates, all the evidence points to a broken regulatory system that leaves nursing homes largely unaccountable and elderly residents vulnerable to neglect.

“Essentially, the federal and state NYNmedia.com

in monitoring abuse and neglect in nursing homes.

Although they have no direct authority over nursing homes, ombudsmen are charged with investigating complaints and working to resolve them by helping residents to report complaints to the Health Department, the attorney general’s office or the police.

Since funding is sparse and the workforce is almost entirely volunteer, there’s only so much they can do.

In New York City, the regional ombudsman program oversees roughly half of the state’s residents in nursing homes – around 50,000 people in 174 nursing homes. If the program were fully funded, it would have 24 paid staff members – instead, it has six.

They manage an unpaid volunteer corps of 90 ombudsmen who work an average of four to six hours a week.

But more than half of the city’s nursing homes do not have an ombudsman assigned to check in on them.

In recent years, formal reports from the ombudsmen dropped precipitously across the state because the New York ombudsmen instituted new reporting methods that were far more labor-intensive for the volunteers. A policy change required them to fill out several pages of paperwork instead of a single-page complaint.

“The number of cases or complaints in New York state absolutely plummeted almost to zero – and it wasn't because there weren't complaints,” said Richard Danford, the ombudsman coordinator for New York City. “It was because the methodology they were using was problematic and the volunteer ombudsmen in the field stopped reporting.”

As a result, Danford said, the figures that New York’s Long Term Care Ombudsman submits to the federal ombudsman office are inaccurate.

“I would really caution you – anybody – against using this number as a measure of really anything reliable,” Danford said. “I hate to tell you that.”

There are plans to revise the reporting practices and improve the data in the future, Danford said.

With a state regulator that sparse-

dispute must then be mediated by a private contractor. A New York Times investigation last year found that arbitrators tend to favor repeat clients, like nursing homes.

An appellate court decision last summer in the case of Friedman v.

The Hebrew Home for the Aged at Riverdale denied the Hebrew Home resident a civil trial because an admission agreement with a forced arbitration clause was signed. Even though New York health law forbids such arbitration clauses, the judge echoed a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that the Federal Arbitration Act supersedes state law. Lawyers are appealing the decision.

Richard Abend, who represents the resident in that case, said that if the decision is upheld, “it will result in the denial of justice to nursing home residents that have been the victims of negligence” and will remove “a powerful incentive” for nursing homes to provide quality nursing care.

Both in court filings and interviews, former residents and their families said chronic understaffing at Hebrew Home was a key problem that led to neglect. They described inattentive or absentee nursing assistants and nurses or doctors who

acted too late to identify and treat basic medical conditions that ultimately led to unnecessary suffering, injury or death.

“Ironic, isn't it, that they seem to lavish more care on the trees than on the humans inside?” Samantha Shubert wrote online. She told City & State that her mother, Sherlee, then 84 years old, was neglected during a stay at the Hebrew Home’s sub-acute rehabilitation unit in July and August of 2013.

Sherlee Shubert developed pressure ulcers – open wounds resulting from a lack of movement that state regulations say should never happen – while under the nursing home’s care, according to Shubert and her mother. Shortly after moving in, her mother called her at night weeping in pain, saying the nursing staff were ignoring her cries for help, Shubert said. Although the Hebrew Home is among the most expensive nursing homes in the country – with beds costing between $459 and $872 a day, or up to $318,280 a year, according to data provided to Caregiverlist by Hebrew Home – the family paid an outside nursing agency to come into the nursing home to care for her mother at night. The agency that provided the care for the Shuberts and other families described the practice as a common way families cope with inadequate care at understaffed nursing homes.

Rebecca Rosenzweig, who owns True Care Home Health Care, the nursing agency that cared for Sherlee Shubert, said there's more elder abuse by way of neglect in nursing homes. “You can get all sorts of infections because somebody wasn't paying attention,” she said.

Hebrew Home acknowledged that residents hire outside nursing agencies, but stressed that “such personnel are prohibited by law from providing any nursing care, which can only be done by Hebrew Home staff.”

For nearly a year after leaving Hebrew Home, Sherlee Shubert remained bedridden because of the pressure sores, which doctors feared would require amputation. In at least two other instances reviewed by City & State, a patient did require an amputation.

Other reports are even grimmer.

Among the 26 lawsuits reviewed by City & State, 13 plaintiffs alleged Hebrew Home residents died a wrongful

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death as the result of negligence or medical malpractice.

One court filing describes Concepcion Elias, a 102-year-old woman in “stable condition” who entered Hebrew Home to take advantage of its well-reputed physical therapy services. But after she was placed in a room with no heat in late winter of 2013, she fell ill with a respiratory condition that doctors failed to treat.

Her grandson Carlos Elias tried to bring in a space heater, but the staff wouldn’t allow it. At nurses’ request, he brought in blankets and sweaters for his grandmother to insulate her from the large drafty window next to her hospital bed.

But in less than three weeks, Concepcion Elias developed a “temperature” and was pronounced dead of “natural causes,” according to nursing home records and her death certificate.

“They could have said, ‘Listen, take her home,’” Elias said. “I’m not going to live in peace for the rest of my life.

It’s my fault – I trusted them.”

Carlos Elias believes the nursing staff and doctors covered up what really happened to his grandmother.

After her death, no one at Hebrew Home would speak with him, he said, and the state Health Department failed to discipline the nursing home. Now, he is bringing a lawsuit against Hebrew Home.

“I am not looking for money,” he said. “I’m looking for justice.”

Although Hebrew Home officials would not comment on pending litigation, they appear to disagree with Carlos Elias on the purpose of neglect lawsuits against nursing homes, according to a copy of presentation slides co-authored by senior officials at Hebrew Home and their law firm, Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker.

In the May 2013 presentation, titled “Good Practices to Avoid Litigation in Nursing Homes,” an early slide asks: “What’s it all about?” The answer: “MONEY!! NOT JUSTICE.” Jim Clyne, president and CEO of LeadingAge New York, which represents nonprofit New York nursing homes and health care providers, holds a similarly dim view of for-

sympathetic jurors for lawsuits. And with potentially thousands of residents cycling through larger nursing homes like Hebrew Home, which has 555 CMS-certified beds, the chances for litigation are increased.

“Listen, no one is justifying if there really is a wrongful death or an injury. That's a bad mistake,” Clyne said, adding that facilities should be held accountable. But, he said, nursing homes are vulnerable to lawsuits because they work with the sick and elderly. As a result, Clyne said, “everybody knows there's going to be litigation.” According to his logic, these factors help explain why there have been two-dozen lawsuits against Hebrew Home since 2010.

But research indicates the number of claims brought against Hebrew Home may be unusually high compared with the national average. Although City & State could not find any comprehensive figures on lawsuits filed against nursing homes in New York, a 2011 study, published in the New England Journal of Medi-

"I WOULD SAY WE HAVE WIDESPREAD FAILURE TO MEET OR EXCEED THE MINIMUM STANDARDS." mer residents or their families suing nursing homes.

Plaintiffs' lawyers in these cases are capitalizing on aggrieved New Yorkers, he said.

“They are the ambulance chasers of the nursing home world,” Clyne said. “For whatever reason – they would say for good reasons, we would say probably not,” there is a segment of lawyers who “actively solicit business for nursing home residents,” he said.

Clyne said that Bronx County, where Hebrew Home is located, is known to be a good place to find

26

cine, analyzing the relationship between quality of care and negligence litigation in nursing homes, found that between 1998 and 2010 U.S. nursing homes generally received about one claim every two years.

By contrast, Hebrew Home averaged more than four lawsuits every year – or about 8 times the national average for a single nursing home.

But even if adjusted for the relatively large size of Hebrew Home, the nursing home still had 43 percent more negligence claims against it than the national average – at least. In computing the national average, the

2011 study included claims settled in arbitration. City & State was unable to include any arbitration claims in its tally of Hebrew Home cases. The nursing home did not provide that information on request.

While researchers who conducted the study said the two-dozen lawsuits against Hebrew Home seemed high, they cautioned that a variety of factors could influence the number of lawsuits, including the litigation climate, as industry representatives noted.

However, the sheer volume of claims begs serious questions, researchers said.

“It raises red flags,” said David Stevenson, associate professor of health policy at Vanderbilt University and a co-author on the study. “Part of what I'd want to know is: How is this a fivestar facility, if it has this many allegations of abuse and neglect? And this many litigation claims against it?"

In particular, Stevenson said, it calls into question the nursing home’s five-star health inspection ratings from the state Health Department. “That’s a little puzzling to me,” he said, noting later that he was “baffled” that a nursing home with so many lawsuits filed against it had not been cited for any deficiencies from those incidents.

Similarly high numbers of negligence lawsuits appear to have been filed against two other Bronx nursing homes: Workmen’s Circle MultiCare Center and Kings Harbor Multicare Center, which also have five-star overall CMS ratings and are comparable in size to Hebrew Home, but charge 30 to 40 percent less than their top-ranked neighbor.

In a statement, Workmen’s Circle touted its five-star rating and said, “lawsuits are an inherent part of this industry.” The administrator for Kings Harbor, Alex Stern, said that both the large size of his nursing home and the high turnover of its sub-acute rehabilitation unit help explain the numerous lawsuits. However, he said he takes the lawsuits very seriously. “Even one lawsuit is

too many,” Stern said.

CMS data also indicate that Hebrew Home only has a two-star rating for nursing staffing, widely considered the most important indicator of quality care. In fact, the nursing home provided 18 percent fewer nursing hours per resident than the national average, or 3 hours and 24 minutes of nursing care per resident per day. This is based on information the nursing home itself submits to regulators.

“I think that's pretty disturbing that the facility itself is saying that they only have a two-star rating for staffing,” said Deborah Truhowsky, president of the board for LTCCC, the advocacy group for nursing home residents.

A Hebrew Home spokesperson insisted that the nursing home “exceeds government measures,” contending that the CMS rating excluded some staff. The ratings are widely seen as imperfect, but are considered the standard way to compare nursing homes.

“Many Hebrew Home staff members who play critical roles in the quality of life of our residents are not included in government staffing measures,” the spokesperson said. On-site physicians, therapists, “barbers and beauticians, wait staff, wellness center and aquatic therapy personnel, and the dozens of nursing students who are employed by or rotate in the Hebrew Home, are not included in government staffing measures, yet provide significant additional care to our residents.”

Nevertheless, advocates said that it is the direct nursing care that matters most.

“Things like bed sores, falls, and malnutrition potentially can happen as a result of inadequacies in daily caregivers. So not enough (nursing staff ) to turn and position people or change (diapers on) people, then that is what's most relevant,” Truhowsky said. “If there's not enough staff for direct care, then residents are going to suffer."

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On a gusty hilltop overlooking the Hudson River one afternoon this spring, a public relations officer led a City & State reporter around the Hebrew Home at Riverdale.

Inside the main complex, she pointed out the Derfner Judaica Museum, an art studio, fish tanks, a friendly therapy dog, and walked through an impressive physical therapy space with a heated pool, ending at the Weinberg Center for Elder Abuse Prevention – touted as “the nation’s first comprehensive shelter for victims of elder abuse.”

From all outward appearances, the residents were lucky to live in what many consider New York’s most elite nursing home. But what was most notable about the tour were the stories left untold – stories of mistreatment suffered inside the nursing home’s walls, and even stories of those who wandered away unnoticed.

According to eyewitness accounts, police reports and Health Department records, it appears that since 2010, several residents have left Hebrew Home undetected, which is called elopement. According to the state Department of Health, elopement occurs when “a resident leaves

the Nursing Home building undetected or fails to return from a (preauthorized) pass.” This can be a serious violation of nursing home regulations, carrying high risks – research shows that after 24 hours, one in four eloped residents will be found dead.

On Aug. 7, 2010, a 75-year-old female resident at Hebrew Home “left the residence by walking out of the main gate,” according to New York City Police Department records. The woman was not found until the next day, state Health Department officials said. The agency cited Hebrew Home for a violation, but stopped short of issuing a fine. Health officials explained that “a fine was not imposed in this instance because, based on the department’s investigation, the incident was isolated, the resident was not injured, and the facility had policies and procedures in place to prevent elopements.”

But there have been at least two other cases of nursing home residents who went missing from Hebrew Home since then.

On July 4, 2015, a 71-year-old Hebrew Home resident with dementia named Sandra Dawson wandered out of Hebrew Home’s main gate

alone, according to Dawson and her husband, Tom. Tom was shocked to find her in their Manhattan apartment that afternoon. Because of her dementia diagnosis, Tom said, Hebrew Home had placed Sandra in the Alzheimer’s unit, but then decided to move her into a less secure area.

Taking the route she described, she appears to have walked at least two miles along Bronx roads before taking the subway into Manhattan.

After her return to Hebrew Home that night, Tom never reported the incident to management for fear of losing a coveted spot at the facility.

That evening, however, he did post about his experience on Yelp, the user review website, to warn others about the facility’s lack of security.

In another incident early this year, on a frigid Feb. 7, New York City Police officials say a 53-year-old Hebrew Home resident was reported missing from the nursing home’s campus – police note only that he was found.

When asked about elopements from the facility, Hebrew Home issued a statement that “there have been no cases of elopement from the Hebrew Home for at least the last five years.”

After City & State provided details of these events, Hebrew Home acknowledged the 2010 elopement but disputed the other incidents in a statement. The nursing home also said that it seeks to balance having a “secure environment” with residents’ right to “leave the campus if they wish” and to “move freely and safely.”

But Hebrew Home refused to elaborate on the specific incidents beyond its statement, which noted it could not legally discuss details regarding the individuals. “However,” it read, “the facts as you have described them are patently incorrect. We reiterate that there have been no elopements from the Hebrew Home in the last five years, which includes these cases.”

Tom and Sandra Dawson disagree, of course – Sandra told Tom she “escaped” more than once.

After the incident, Tom looked into other nursing homes. But for now, he cares for Sandra himself.

“Some of these places I wouldn’t take my dog to,” Tom said. But after visiting about 10 other facilities in the area, he conceded that Hebrew Home was, quite simply, “the best of a bad lot.”

PERSPECTIVES

DE BLASIO CONTROVERSY IS GIVING NONPROFITS A BAD NAME

By AIMÉE SIMPIERRE

N

onprofits have been dominating New York City news coverage lately. But not for their efforts to stem the homelessness crisis, or for their work with young people with disabilities, or for their care of older adults and other vulnerable populations. These nonprofits – established by allies of Mayor Bill de Blasio and supporting his agenda – have been in the news for accepting financial contributions from individuals and entities that have business before the city.

Every time another tendril of this controversy unfurls, the term nonprofit is bantered about in a way that is beginning to sound, at least to those who care about the sector, NYNmedia.com

more and more like a curse.

“Court Is Asked to Compel de Blasio Nonprofit to Heed Subpoena,” “Federal Probe Expands to Nonprofit Tied to New York Mayor Bill de Blasio” the headlines scream.

Who wouldn’t want to distance themselves from this growing menace that seems to be, once again, underscoring the public’s greatest fears about nonprofits – that they are abusing their tax-exempt status and misusing funds in their care? So I feel it is important, as often and as thoroughly as possible, to make the distinction between political nonprofits and the rest of the sector. When that distinction is not made, the nonprofit sector as a whole – one that is already struggling to build public trust and sustain its fiscal health – wears the negative press of all these new scandals like an albatross around the neck.

It is true, the organizations at the heart of the alleged wrongdoing on behalf of the mayor’s agenda are nonprofits. But they are not human services nonprofits working with limited resources to help new immigrants learn the English language or low-income teens get into college. These are political nonprofits – 501(c)4s.

They are tax exempt, but exist for very different reasons than 501(c)(3) s. According to the IRS, 501(c)(3) nonprofits are granted exemptions for

“charitable, religious, educational, scientific,” and other such purposes.

They are charitable organizations – where “charity” is defined as including “relief of the poor, the distressed, or the underprivileged,” among other tasks. They are severely limited in the amount of political lobbying they can participate in and are forbidden from being organized or operated for the benefit of private interests.

501(c)(4) organizations, on the other hand, are social welfare organizations that may lobby as their primary activity without jeopardizing their tax-exempt status. Funds in their care are sometimes referred to as “dark money” because 501(c)(4)s can receive unlimited contributions from corporations, individuals, or unions without making the source of these donations public. They can even inform “the public and policymakers about legislative and public policy options” – as Campaign for One New York’s certificate of incorporation declares – as long as their actions pass muster with the Conflict of Interest Board. (Whether the COIB has the enforcement capability to regulate dark-money nonprofits is another story.)

It remains to be seen whether anyone related to de Blasio’s 501(c)(4)s will be charged with wrongdoing, but there’s already much wrong being done to the reputation of well-mean-

ing human services agencies across the state as the press gives the playby-play on this unfolding drama.

How can we address this? The harm could be ameliorated somewhat if the media is consistently careful to specify in headlines and throughout their news copy that “de Blasio’s nonprofits” are 501(c)(4) political nonprofits. At New York Nonprofit Media, we have made the editorial decision not to cover the activities of these “dark money” nonprofits, because we find their work and intent to be significantly different from the primarily human services nonprofits we cover. Our sister publication, City & State, is careful to call these entities “political nonprofits” in its headlines and draw the distinction throughout its stories.

These choices – being made right now at editorial desks across the state about a story that’s likely to be in the public eye for quite a bit longer – are significant in that they can be used to make subtle distinctions among nonprofits and help prevent the entire sector from being painted with the same scandalous brush.

So, to all who are in the business of choosing words, I implore you to choose well when you cover this issue. And for the sake of every well-meaning nonprofit in the state, I can only hope your choices help the public make that distinction, too.

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PERSPECTIVES

WHAT MATTERS: THOUGHTS ON NONPROFIT LEADERSHIP

By NANCY WACKSTEIN

Nancy Wackstein, director of community engagement and partnerships at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Social Service

ACTUALLY, BEING CONNECTED TO THE COMMUNIT Y WAS AS IMPORTANT TO MAINTAINING MY OWN SANIT Y AND SENSE OF BELONGING AS IT WAS TO FULFILLING ANY HYPOTHESES ABOU T LEADERSHIP.

D

oes it matter if the executive director of a ballet company has never danced? If the president of a symphony orchestra has never played an instrument? Or if the CEO of a social services agency has never practiced social work?

I have been thinking about these questions a lot lately as I observe the people being selected by boards of directors to lead a variety of nonprofit organizations. Their backgrounds are often in fundraising, financial management, marketing or other technical aspects of business operations. They’re fungible skills that can be carried from an arts organization to a legal services organization to an environmental organization.

The trend has become so prevalent that frankly, these days, when I read about an art historian or cu-

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rator being selected to head a museum, I’m surprised.

But does it really matter?

Does it actually make a difference for mission-based organizations whether the leaders they select have personally been exposed to the challenges or needs the organization is engaged in addressing? Do more “technically skilled” leaders make decisions differently from those who have more experience with the organization’s programs or subject matter? Can leaders be “authentic” if they have never experienced what their staff, clients or constituencies have?

I believe these are profound questions amid the generational shift in nonprofit leadership – a shift we are thick into as baby boomers move on from leadership posts in greater and greater numbers. I believe

these questions get to the heart of which characteristics make for the most effective nonprofit leaders. Is it charisma, presence and passion, regardless of subject-matter experience – or can anyone run a nonprofit as long as they can raise money, effectively “sell” the mission and prepare a break-even annual budget? Or perhaps these questions are impossible and irresponsible to answer except on a case-by-case basis.

For me, I believe it matters that, long before I was hired to run a settlement house in New York City in the 1990s, I had worked at a New York City public high school on the Lower East Side of Manhattan for kids who had been expelled from regular schools. Thanks to this job as a remedial reading teacher very early in my career, even before I went to graduate school in social work, I

got to know these young people, understand their challenges and learn from their resilience. From them, I found inspiration (even though they were labeled “bad kids” – this was the ’70s after all). With their help, I ultimately found my calling.

Similarly, working at a New York City Housing Authority project in East Harlem, also in the 1970s, allowed me to appreciate firsthand the complexities of living without the support of safe neighborhoods, good schools and adequate income; I also learned how to have a lot of fun with the people of the community.

So when I arrived at Lenox Hill Neighborhood House as Executive Director in 1991 – my first nonprofit executive job – I believe my prior experience gave me a greater understanding of our participants’ lives.

It made me more determined to make myself as accessible as possible to both them and our staff, notwithstanding the pressures to raise money and manage a large board of directors. Actually, being connected to the community was as important to maintaining my own sanity and sense of belonging as it was to fulfilling any hypotheses about leadership.

I felt comfortable listening and talking and joking with our participants; and I knew that building that sense of community was critical to sustaining our identity as a settlement house.

The respect I had for our participant’s strengths and their challenges was forged through my prior work experiences – and it made me a better and more authentic executive director of that settlement house. I think. On the other hand, not knowing what a P and L statement was, or what P and C insurance means, or how to read a balance sheet or a Form 990 tax return, at first made it more challenging for me to exercise the financial management and oversight that is absolutely essential for any nonprofit leader.

I want to be clear. In no way am I suggesting that our next generation of nonprofit leaders will have a passion gap or a commitment gap.

Quite the contrary. Nor am I suggesting that they will lack the qualifications to run these organizations.

In many cases, they probably will be even more qualified to run the business side of a complicated nonprofit (and they all are businesses!) than many of my generation were when we assumed these roles. I simply am questioning which attributes nonprofit boards of directors should consider as they choose their next leaders.

I also hope, now that I’m affiliated with an academic institution, that the many talented researchers who focus on effective leadership in the nonprofit field will continue to dive in and seek answers to these significant questions.

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June 2016

Issue N°9 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

PERSPECTIVES

THE TROUBLE WITH CITY CONTRACTS

By JOANNE PAGE

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n my 27 years at The Fortune Society, there has never been a time when the nonprofit community in New York City has been under so much pressure to achieve results, while restrictions on the government funding we receive continue to increase.

All this while the needs of the populations we serve are escalating.

This is true across all service areas, not just in criminal justice and re-entry, The Fortune Society’s area of expertise.

Approximately 90 percent of Fortune’s total annual revenue comes from 80 public and private contracts.

Key to our success has always been maximizing the impact of these government grants by leveraging funding from multiple sources to pay our staff and cover Other Than Personnel Services and indirect costs.

However, in recent years, this has become ever more difficult and near impossible in many cases, because there are so many restrictions on the use of government funds.

In many cases, we must report staff “time and effort” on contracts, meaning the only staff members who can be covered under the contract are those that serve clients who fit the eligibility criteria for that particular program. This complicates human resources procedures and significantly increases the time that staff must spend on reporting and administrative tasks, reducing their capacity to serve clients.

We are also seeing more and more city contracts that define client eligibility very narrowly, such as by ZIP code, age, or, for instance, parole status. This siloed approach limits our ability to maximize our impact

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and meet the needs of clients.

The reality is that the populations we serve are very transient; many are “couch surfing” and might be staying with family or friends in Brooklyn one month, and the next month living in the Bronx. Fortune’s funding should not be restricted simply because those we serve do not yet have a stable address or because their place of residence is outside the specific ZIP codes allowable under the contract.

In addition, contracts – especially city contracts – are consistently executed late. Right now, we are actively providing services and incurring costs on contracts whose renewals have yet to be executed. Many of them had a start date of July 1, 2015. The result? We cannot submit vouchers for payment and we cannot be reimbursed. When contract execution is delayed and we end up being paid late or not all, we have to draw down our line of credit, incurring significant interest that grows our debt.

Overall, many city contracts do not pay the full cost of providing services and achieving the outcomes

that we are expected to achieve.

That alone puts Fortune in a position of deficit spending, as we need to subsidize these contracts with other funds.

In addition, city contracts also limit funding for indirect costs.

While we have a federally-approved indirect rate of 19 percent, too many city contracts restrict our indirect rate to 10 percent or as low as 5 percent. This means limited funding for infrastructure, information technology, evaluation and quality improvement, human resources, finance and executive management and oversight. These infrastructure costs continue to multiply each year, as we continually need more sophisticated equipment and technology, along with highly skilled staff, to manage these growing demands.

Lastly, as the minimum wage rises to $15 per hour – and Fortune supports this effort – government contracts must increase the salaries for front-line staff immediately so that nonprofits can handle the payroll increase.

Like Fortune, other nonprofits in New York City are struggling to

effectively manage and maximize limited resources. City contracts are making this effort all the more difficult.

As charitable organizations, we are mission-driven. Fortune exemplifies this mission-driven focus, as we have evolved holistically to meet the needs of the men and women coming through our doors. This commitment to comprehensively address the complex needs of people with criminal justice histories and to serve anyone regardless of the nature of their criminal record is core to Fortune’s identity and mission. And we do this whether or not our approach fits the ever-narrowing eligibility rules on government contracts. This is why we are so effective.

A recently published Human Services Council Report, “New York Nonprofits in the Aftermath of FEGS: A Call to Action,” captures many of these problems in detail.

The report emphasizes that government contracts rarely cover operating costs and provide payments late and unpredictably, resulting in cash flow obstacles and chronic underfunding.

If we, as nonprofits, are expected to meet the expanding demands of the people we serve in the most effective and efficient way possible, while continuing to innovate and improve on the work we do, it is imperative that we be given greater flexibility in the use of city funding, rather than increased restrictions and more demands on our limited resources.

The nonprofit world in New York City is at great risk right now. If nothing is done to change this onerous system, I am afraid we will see more nonprofits – like FEGS – unable to keep their doors open – resulting in fewer services available to New Yorkers in need, while the crises of poverty, homelessness, and reentry continue to escalate.

JoAnne Page is president and CEO of The Fortune Society, an agency founded in 1967 to help incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals. These comments were prepared as part of her testimony at the April 4 hearing of the City Council’s Committee on Contracts.

LIKE FORTUNE, OTHER NONPROFITS IN NEW YORK CITY ARE STRUGGLING TO EFFECTIVELY MANAGE AND MAXIMIZE LIMITED RESOURCES. CITY CONTRACTS ARE MAKING THIS EFFORT ALL THE MORE DIFFICULT. 29

Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

PERSPECTIVES

FIGHTING FOR A FAIRER BUDGET ON THE STEPS OF CITY HALL

By GREGORY BRENDER

This process leaves staff in human services programs wondering up to the last minute if they are going to have jobs come July.

The mayor can improve this process by adding and baselining funds so that dollars can be allocated over multiple years. This will give providers the opportunity to prepare programs and offer their staff the stability they deserve.

Fairly compensate our early childhood educators: Community-based early childhood programs serve the youngest and the poorest children in New York City. They provide excellent care and education so young children can learn and start school ready to succeed. In fact, UNH’s analysis of the city’s own evaluation of prekindergarten programs found that community-based organizations outperformed public schools in nine out of 10 metrics.

However, these very same programs are in danger of losing their staff. Teachers, staff and directors at community-based early childhood programs are paid far less than their counterparts in public schools and many apply for pub-

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jobs and better working conditions, English literacy is a fundamental prerequisite.

However, New York City eliminated over $6 million in adult literacy funds last year, resulting in the loss of classes for over 6,300 students. This cut dramatically impacted the immigrant population as well as other adult learners hoping to improve their lives, with over 14,000 adult learners currently estimated to be on waitlists.

New York City must invest $16 million to support roughly 8,700 students in new community-based adult literacy programs such as English for Speakers of Other Languages, Basic Education in Native Language, Adult Basic Education and High School Equivalency preparation.

Save community-based mental health programs: Through Mayor de Blasio’s ThriveNYC Initiative, New York City is taking bold steps to expand mental health services. At the same time, long-standing mental health programs with reputations for quality neighborhood-based services are at risk of closure.

ith its concrete steps, few

flowers grow at New York City Hall. But every spring, providers and advocates for human services plant themselves on the steps of City Hall to push for funding for key programs.

Sadly, with a budget that does not adequately support neighborhood-based services, communities across New York City have to fight annually for funding for many of the core services that support and strengthen New York City’s families.

My colleagues and I at United Neighborhood Houses, a federation of New York City settlement houses and community centers, will be at City Hall to call for a budget that funds the programs that help families and individuals succeed – including early childhood education, year-round after-school programs, summer jobs for teenagers, adult literacy education, and supportive services for older adults.

Let me start with some of the good things that are happening.

The Mayor’s Executive Budget gives case managers in Department for the Aging-contracted case management programs a well-deserved raise. On the 25th anniversary of the Beacon program, rates for Beacon Community Centers will increase, and Mayor Bill de Blasio has committed to funding a $15 minimum wage for staff in city contracted human services programs by January 1, 2019. But there is still so 30

THE CITY COUNCIL ALLOCATES A SMALL PROPORTION OF THE CITY BUDGET, BUT THAT FRACTION PLAYS A HUGE ROLE IN HUMAN SERVICES FUNDING AS IT SUPPORTS KEY SERVICES. much left to achieve.

This spring, on the steps of City Hall, here is what we advocate: End the budget dance: The City Council allocates a small proportion of the city budget, but that fraction plays a huge role in human services funding as it supports key services including thousands of summer jobs for teenagers, many after-school programs, legal services for immigrants and tenants, and space and transportation costs for senior centers.

While City Council members are often committed to supporting these programs, the City Council can only allocate funds one year at a time and only once each year when the budget is adopted late in June. After a budget is finally in place, providers must scramble to start programs. That leaves providers implementing programs such as the Summer Youth Employment Program – which starts July 5 and is partially funded through a last-minute infusion of dollars from the City Council – only a few days to get programs up and running.

lic assistance and live at or near poverty. Because of this disparity, community-based programs lose many of their staff who love their jobs and care about children but simply cannot afford to continue to be paid inadequately.

For several years, early childhood educators, parents and advocates have rallied to support equal pay for equal work for staff in community-based early childhood programs. In this year’s budget, the city must take action to achieve salary parity for the early childhood workforce.

Restore funding for adult literacy: 2.2 million adult New Yorkers currently lack English proficiency, a high school diploma, or both. For these mostly low-income New Yorkers, adult literacy programs are a necessary first step to improving their quality of life. From being able to communicate with their children’s teachers, their family doctor or a police officer, to being able to access workforce training and higher education opportunities, to obtaining better-paying

The de Blasio administration baselined funding for three City Council-funded mental health programs serving special populations: the Geriatric Mental Health Initiative, the Children Under 5 Initiative, and the Autism Awareness Initiative. Unfortunately, in creating its procurement of these programs, the number of contractors has been significantly reduced, at times leaving only one provider to serve an entire borough. This will leave many communities without services.

To preserve community access to these longstanding successful programs, City Council must restore funding for these three initiatives.

It is appalling that communities must fight each year for core services that keep their neighborhoods strong. But, by gathering at City Hall and raising our voices, we remind elected officials how vital the services provided by settlement houses and other community-based organizations are to our families and neighbors. See you on the steps!

NYNmedia.com

June 2016

Issue N°9

The go-to career center for New York’s nonprofit industry.

Featuring thousands of jobs each year, NYN Careers helps large and small nonprofits fill positions ranging from directors to human resources staffers.

Contact: Lissa Blake LBlake@NYNmedia.com

CAREERS

CAREER BOARD

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MULTIPLE OPPORTUNITIES

MULTIPLE OPPORTUNITIES

MULTIPLE OPPORTUNITIES

Life’s WORC is a leading Agency which provides services to individuals with Developmental Disabilities and Autism. We have just been named as one of the 2016 Best Companies to Work for in NY by the Society of Human Resources Management.

We have positions available as Direct Support Professionals, Residential Nurses and Managers. We offer competitive salaries, excellent benefits and opportunities for advancement.

Visit our website at www.lifesworc.org for more details about our Agency.

The Ryan Network is dedicated to providing high quality, affordable, comprehensive, linguistically appropriate and culturally competent health care services to medically underserved populations. All patients are treated equally with dignity, respect, courtesy, confidentiality and concern for safety.

Open Positions: - Licensed Practical Nurses - Licensed Clinical Social Workers - Registered Nurses for Managerial roles Want to join an organization that thinks differently?

Ryan Network is an Equal Opportunity Employer, www.ryancenter.org

Administrative Supervisor(LCSW) (Pleasantville, NY/Bronx, NY/Brooklyn, NY) JCCA is seeking Administrative Supervisors to provide leadership, support, and direction to case management and social work staff in our residential/community programs, in accordance with Agency policy/governmental regulations. Supervisors will be responsible for the implementation of policies and procedures dictated by funding source and agency as they relate to day-to-day operation of the program. REQUIREMENTS: LCSW, min. 2 years post MSW supervisory experience. Bilingual/Spanish preferred.

Candidates should submit a cover letter/ resume to careers@ryancenter.org.

Social Worker (Pleasantville, NY/Bronx, NY/Brooklyn, NY) JCCA is seeking Social Workers to provide treatment and case planning for children with emotional problems who require residential treatment and for their families in accordance with Agency policy/governmental regulations. Social Workers will provide therapeutic services to children and families with a minimum of one therapeutic contact per youth per week. REQUIREMENTS: MSW/LMSW, great clinical assessment and interpersonal skills. Bilingual/Spanish preferred.

For consideration, please email your resume to: employment@lifesworc.org.

DIVISION DIRECTOR Division Director of the Transitional Residence for Alien Children (TRAC) needed to work at Residential Treatment Center located in Dobbs Ferry, NY. The Division Director reports to the Senior VP for Programs and responsible for assisting with the day-to-day management of the Division of Immigration Services and for developing expansion into non-residential services for children and families. The senior manager will develop and maintain strong knowledge regarding the Federal UC programs, the mandates and expectations. Ability to communicate proficiently with both UC’s, their families and staff in Spanish and English is required. The Division Director will maintain a strong and effective working relationship with the ORR/DCS Project Officer and ORR/DCS Federal Field Specialist to understand emerging program opportunities and to ensure program compliance and that the UC’s needs are being met.

To apply online please visit our website at www.childrensvillage.org/employment.

CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER/EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT As a key member of the Executive Management Team, the CFO/Executive Vice President will report directly to the President/CEO and interface with the Board of Directors and sub-committees on forecasting, strategic, financial, and operational matters. The candidate will manage day-to-day financial responsibilities in the Fiscal Department including accounting, purchasing, and information technology. He or she will ensure financial compliance with the NY State and NY City agencies which fund the organization.

Candidate should have a Master’s degree in business administration, finance or accounting or a CPA with a Bachelor’s degree. A minimum of ten years experience in accounting or financial management is required along with a proven track record of excellence and leadership.

If you are interested, please contact Dr. Heather Waitman, Executive Vice President of Human Resources and Workforce Management at 845 359 3400 x 332 or email: hwaitman@sdomhome.org

DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT Mercy Haven Inc., a non-profit mental health agency, seeks indiv w/high energy who is creative & self-motivated.

Bachelor’s Degree in related field w/ min of 3 years’ experience in development and supervision with excellent oral, written and management skills.

Responsibilities include (not limited to): donor solicitation; experience in planning and executing fundraising events, overseeing grant writing, design and purchasing of marketing material and social media and representing agency with local organization and community groups.

Excel benefits. Sal: $70K/yr. FAX resume to: 631-277-9735 or e-mail to colzinski@ mercyhaven.com EEO employer

Send resumes to campusresumes@jccany.org.

DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT AND COMMUNITY RELATIONS Abbot House is seeking an experienced, energetic development professional to plan and implement a comprehensive and aggressive fundraising program to include annual giving, grant proposals, special events, and the creation and implementation of an agency communication and marketing plan including social media. The candidate will report to the C.E.O. and will work with the Board of Directors to set goals and lead a strategic plan to broaden the support base and oversee the growth of all development activities.

To qualify we require at least five years experience in nonprofit development and a demonstrated record of success in increasing and diversifying funding streams and securing foundation and corporate support, superior writing ability and excellent interpersonal and communication skills. Also required is a working knowledge of the Westchester/New York philanthropic community ideally with established connections in the community.

Fax or e-mail resume with cover letter & salary requirements to: 914-591-9435, HR Dept hr@abbotthouse.net

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Issue N°9

June 2016 MEDIA - REVIEW - DIGITAL - CAREERS - EVENTS

SEPTEMBER 15, 2016 8AM – 5PM AT CUNY GRADUATE CENTER 34TH ST AND 5TH AVE Join NYN Media for our second annual MarkCon: Building Your Brand: Marketing, Public Relations and Social Media for New York’s Nonprofits Panel Discussions to include: Secrets to Implementing a Positive Rebrand or Brand Transformation How to Create and Gain Awareness of your Events Integrating Data with Marketing Tactics Applying Integrated Marketing Campaigns to Non-Profits Brand architecture: connecting the dots of your programs Keys to Success in Digital and Mobile Marketing How to incorporate social media into your communication and marketing efforts And a Special Insider’s View: Successful Turnaround of a 120-year old Nonprofit

Thank you to our generous sponsors:

For speaking, sponsorship, exhibition questions, please contact Kelly Murphy at 917 952 4994 or kmurphy@cityandstateny.com 32

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