Foundation Journal

Small nonprofits struggle with maintaining their programs and services on a number of levels, and sometimes the seemingly huge problems, like a broken furnace, remind workers and staff that some problems are easy to solve. The Kansas City Indian Center , until recently named the Heart of America Indian Center, is no different. The organization delivers important social services to clients, yet holds a vision to expand its reach into the Native American community. On Friday, January 14, 2011, while completing a service project supported by Harvesters food bank in Kansas City, I arrived to learn that their furnace had been replaced after a worker discovered high levels of carbon monoxide. The center was back in stride, not only after a furnace replacement, but also after recent staff turnover. New executive director Steve Jackson took time out of his schedule to describe changes needed to the phone and voice mail systems. The organization recently hired Gayl Edmunds, a new counselor w

Jeremy Alderson, director of the national Homelessness Marathon , participated in a community dinner on Saturday, January 16 to share information about a radio broadcast on homelessness at KKFI studios. The purpose of the event was to bring people together to build support for the annual radio show broadcast to 100 radio stations throughout the U.S. and Canada. Alderson remarked how homelessness and poverty are likely to increase despite the heightened focus to these issues during the 14-hour national radio broadcast.  He stressed the importance of people working together to end homelessness. Like the suffrage and civil rights movements, sometimes the way forward is attacked, Alderson added, but still calls for people to keep working. Jeff Humfeld, coordinator of the Homelessness Marathon broadcast on KKFI 90.1 FM , described Listening Rooms as a way to begin "citizen dialog" on the issue, a way to engage community members in understanding and working on homelessness and

Grist.org's food section asked 20 or so notable people to share their favorite books from 2010 . The articled pointed out that: Two brand-new books did stand out for a number of our folks: Paul Greenberg's ultimately hopeful lament for the troubled oceans, Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food ; and Jan Poppendick's Free for All: Fixing School Food in America , a rigorous, highly charged history of public school lunches. Both are very much books of the moment. My list includes no books that were published in 2010, but those that I read during the year. The Food Wars (Verso 2009) by Walden Bello is a wide critique of the food industry's profit motives throughout the world. It's a heavyweight that weighs in at 149 pages. He sets up and debunks common myths, such as the causes of the "food crisis" of 2006-2008, benefits of the "green revolution," as well as taking readers on a history of how monetary policy and trade agreements have impac

In 2003 after 75 years in the trucking business and with merger mania taking hold in many industrial and service fields, YRC Worldwide bit the bullet and purchased Roadway, it's largest less-than-truckload competitor based in Akron, Ohio. Why would it be any different for two companies, each with $3 billion annual revenue, providing a similar nationwide freight business? Other companies in computers, banks, pharmaceuticals, telecomms all merged or acquired competitors -- all in the name of "improving shareholder wealth." Think HP buying Compaq, or Glaxo Wellcome acquiring SmithKlineBeecham. Anyone who's been employed by a company that was acquired knows they are at risk of losing their job, no matter what executives say to dispel rumors or low morale. The bottomline is that to improve the bottomline means reducing "redundant systems" like payroll departments, accounting applications, data centers, you name it. In 2005 when Yellow-Roadway bought regional ca

This case study documents the process that Harvesters food bank followed to develop a long-needed employee website in 2009. My role on the project included: (1) acted as liaison to Sharepoint developer (2) documented site structure (3) migrated content and trained end-users and (4) performed ongoing, primary Sharepoint site administrator duties. Overview Access to timely, accurate and reliable information is critical to all Harvesters employees. Various Harvesters departments – Fund Development, Community Outreach, Agency Services, Warehouse, Administration – have a large amount of documents and forms to exchange. Providing tools to manage this information is essential to improving efficient office and employee communication. A quick and easy ability to share these documents has been difficult. Typically, Harvesters teams rely on the shared network drive to store documents, which made information difficult to find and organize. Many non-profit organizations have deployed intrane

In 2004 an encounter with a methamphetamine addict enlightened me to the devastating impact the drug holds on those that use it. In reaction to a shaky personal relationship with a boyfriend, we co-signed a car loan for a family member to help her keep her job at an area retailer. She seemed to be inspired by the work for the national retail outlet, rising to a manager position and receiving a wage sufficient to keep her in an apartment. Early signs appeared that made us question the relationship -- more than one physical attack by her boyfriend, frequently moving to different apartments, loss of the good-paying job. One occurrence resulted in his breaking into our home in search for his girlfriend and their newborn baby. His threatening behavior caused my daughters to hide in the corner of the basement, while my wife talked him out of the house and waiting for police to arrive. Another early sign -- during attendance at a concert at Sandstone Ampitheatre in Kansas I remember him wal