Complain against the Rochester Area Community Foundation to the National Council on Foundations
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Council on Foundations
1828 L Street, NW Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036
Janne Gallagher:
I am writing to file a complaint and request assistance in dealing with the Rochester Area Community Foundation. The Rochester Area Community Foundation has ignored and violated the National Standards for U.S. Community Foundations, as well as basic ethical standards against Friends Helping Friends, a small grassroots organization. Friends Helping Friends cannot afford legal counsel to sue the Rochester Area Community Foundation, although we have already hired legal counsel in dealing with the RACF. Basically, in November of 2004, Friends Helping Friends received a $10,000 grant to disperse to Second Life Bikes, a d/b/a for Ray Fitzgerald, a private individual that ran a bike shop out of his house, to teach kids to repair bikes while giving away bikes to the community. Friends Helping Friends dispersed the money to Ray Fitzgerald and Ray did not follow through in implementing the described programming. Towards the end of the grant period, the partnership between Friends Helping Friends and Mr. Fitzgerald began to dissolve into an ugly conflict largely due to the efforts of Mr. Fitzgerald. Mr. Fitzgerald sent inflammatory and slanderous letters to all funders of the project in an effort to secure additional funding for his project; I was able to get a copy of Mr. Fitzgerald's correspondence to the City of Rochester through the Freedom of Information Law.
The Rochester Area Community Foundation was clear about using FHF as a fiscal sponsor for Second Life Bikes and interviewed Mr. Fitzgerald, a local hero for his philanthropy, but met with no-one from FHF while deciding on awarding the funding. Although we may have made some mistakes, we feel that FHF went above and beyond our responsibility as a fiscal sponsor, but that the program failed due to Second Life Bikes inability to implement the programming. Overall, we feel that Mr. Fitzgerald is a good person, but was unable to take his “backyard bike shop†to the next level of a more formal nonprofit and Friends Helping Friends did not have the administrative capacity to properly deal with Mr. Fitzgerald and Second Life Bikes. However, Rochester Area Community Foundation handled handled their role in this situation especially poorly. Since cancelling the partnership with Second Life Bikes/Ray Fitzgerald, Friends Helping Friends has mobilized the community and has successfully moved forward with the program, despite the many difficulties left for FHF to sort out.
FHF had difficulty reporting on the project, because we were in the middle of a partnership dissolution immediately prior to the reporting deadline and Mr. Fitzgerald had refused to provide any details or reports to us. After an initial report, we met in person with the RACF and gave a considerable amount of documentation and information to the Rochester Area Community Foundation describing the unusual series of events that had happened. The Rochester Area Community Foundation subsequently demanded full repayment of the grant. On April 13th, 2006, the Rochester Area Community Foundation issued a public statement on behalf of the Rochester Area Community Foundation (exhibit #1) asserting that the Rochester Area Community Foundation was pursuing “legal action†and “all means available to us [the Rochester Area Community Foundation] to secure repayment of the grant.â€
Shortly after receiving the correspondence, I, on behalf of Friends Helping Friends, invited the Rochester Area Community Foundation (exhibit #2) to arbitration and offered to repay any portion of the grant that the arbiter, or any other neutral third party, decided. The Rochester Area Community Foundation ignored our request for arbitration (exhibit #3) and our subsequent requests to meet in person to talk about the matter. Thus, the RACF issued a “contrary to fact†statement about our organization that has deterred a number of funders from providing monetary support to Friends Helping Friends. The RACF actually refused to and ignored FHF's efforts to repay the grant. After Friends Helping Friends was denied funding from the City of Rochester based on factually inaccurate information from the Rochester Area Community Foundation (exhibit #4), FHF hired a lawyer to threaten litigation against the RACF, if they didn't stop lying about us (exhibit #5). The RACF's legal counsel responded by sending us a vague letter stating that the particular matter was closed and that basically the RACF never had any intention of suing FHF (exhibit #6). The City of Rochester's Bureau of Human Services and the Ronald McDonald House Charities both cited, in writing, false information from the RACF as their reason for not providing funding for Friends Helping Friends. As recently as in the past couple months, I have corresponded with Lesley Jarbe from the Ronald McDonald House Charities and provided documentation that the RACF did not sue us, as a prerequisite for FHF to receive funding from the Ronald McDonald House Charities (exhibit #7). The RMHC has previously cited the RACF's impending lawsuit as a reason for not funding FHF. I'd wager that many more foundations and funders have followed the Rochester Area Community Foundations blacklisting of Friends Helping Friends and still to this day refuse to fund FHF due to a “contrary to fact†statement that the RACF issued to the public.
Therefore, I find it unacceptable that the Rochester Area Community Foundation would make a monetary contribution, if only $250 from a component fund (exhibit #11), to Friends Helping Friends, while currently blacklisting Friends Helping Friends. After I hired a lawyer to represent Friends Helping Friends and correspond with the RACF and encourage resolution on this matter, an attorney representing the RACF did send correspondence making a vague private statement insinuating that the RACF had decided not to take legal action against FHF. However, FHF needs either a public retraction from the Rochester Area Community Foundation or some sort of public award that would correct the damage that the RACF's “contrary to fact†statement has caused our organization. Since the RACF is providing funding for Friends Helping Friends, if only through a component fund of the Rochester Area Community Foundation, then apparently the RACF deems FHF to be in good standing with the RACF and Friends Helping Friends' work to be worthwhile. I sent correspondence to Jennifer Leonard, RACF Exec. Director requesting that the RACF correct its previous public statement on July 18th and have not heard back from Ms. Leonard.
I feel that the RACF had a difficult decision in regards to Friends Helping Friends and Second Life Bikes. However, the RACF chose to defame Friends Helping Friends in an effort to blacklist the small grassroots organization into bankruptcy to solve the problem. I felt this decision was the wrong decision to make; since Friends Helping Friends is still around and the Rochester Area Community Foundation's donors have requested to donate their money to Friends Helping Friends, I think that the RACF should formally the correct the damage its done to Friends Helping Friends and the Greater Rochester Community. The Rochester Area Community Foundation refused to deal with the awkward situation in a professional and honest manner, but just chose to abuse their power as the largest funder in the Rochester area against a small, struggling grassroots organization. The Rochester Area Community Foundation has wrongly cost FHF large amounts of funding and prevents a unique and needed program from securing funding it needs to successfully operate.
Furthermore, I felt that an undisclosed conflict of interest may have instigated this unusual & unethical behavior on behalf of the Rochester Area Community Foundation. I, Mr. Andrew Stankevich, had a disagreement with Sarah Lentini, a director of a smaller arts foundation, the Arts & Cultural Council for the Greater Rochester area, where I felt the foundation did us wrong and failed to fulfill its obligation as a funder to our organization. In an effort to get the foundation to do what I felt it should do, I contacted the Board of the Arts & Cultural Council, as well as other members of the community to let them know my opinion on the matter. Mr. Michael Cooney, Esq., sent me a certified letter accusing me of slander/defamation and implying that he would sue me if I kept voicing my opinion on the matter (exhibit #10). I felt that I was telling the truth and sent Sarah Lentini a narrative regarding my complaint and asked her to correct any information that she felt was untrue. Ms. Lentini never responded to me and I sent in a written complaint to the NYS Council on the Arts (NYSCA). Michael Cooney served on the Rochester Area Community Foundation Board of Directors and the decision to revoke the funding came shortly after I sent in a complaint to NYSCA. Aside from possibly putting us out business, the letter that the RACF issued also had the additional effect of discrediting me and preventing me from complaining further against the Arts & Cultural Council. Mr. Cooney was engaged in a conflict with me, personally, while serving on the board of the RACF and deciding how to resolve the grant situation with Second Life Bikes; Mr. Cooney acted in the best interest of winning the previous conflict, and not in the best interests of the RACF.
Friends Helping Friends is easily deserving of a public award or compensatory funding for our work. I've enclosed a packet of information with pictures and newsclippings documenting our work. All of the clippings and pictures documents (excluding the beginning of the construction work) happened after the RACF issued the contrary to fact statement insinuating that the Rochester Area Community Foundation was suing Friends Helping Friends. Friends Helping Friends is still completing building construction work to 226-230 Hudson Avenue and our other properties, and is in the process of applying for funding for construction work from the New York State Dept. of Housing and Community Renewal. FHF has met with Mike Coniff, our contact at the City of Rochester's Community Development Dept. who supports our work and is working to research community needs assessments for our DHCR application for our bike shop at 226-230 Hudson Avenue, as well as our thrift store at 333 Child Street (exhibit #8). FHF has also received supportive correspondence from Bob Duffy, the Mayor of Rochester (exhibit #9). Although the Office of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention declined our earlier application for funding, I have reapplied for under an Request for Proposals for experimental programs combatting juvenile delinquency. I work full time for less than minimum wage without medical coverage and ride a bicycle as my main means of transportation, since I cannot afford a car after Jennifer Leonard, on behalf of the Rochester Area Community Foundation, discouraged local foundations and other entities from donating to FHF.
I also feel that the RACF's harshly negative response against Friends Helping Friends was due to our identity as small, grassroots organization. I belong to the faith-based, missionary Catholic Worker movement which calls for voluntary poverty, witnessing for peace and justice, as well as being personally involved with charitable work of providing services to those in need. www.catholicworker.org Most Catholic Worker groups do not seek out foundation or govt. funding for the belief that the modern charity state is fundamentally immoral and that Catholic Worker groups will not be treated fairly. Although as pacifists, Catholic Workers are opposed to the current Bush Administration, the “Unlevel Playing Field†(the report that launched the “faith-based initiativeâ€) agrees strongly that most federal funders don't evaluate federal contractors beyond the spending of the money and that govt. funders do not treat grassroots organizations fairly. Incidentally, FHF was one of the grassroots organizations that received funding through George Bush's faith-based initiative. Although Friends Helping Friends and/or myself were involved with a couple of controversial political situations in the past couple , I feel though I and/or Friends Helping Friends has done nothing wrong and would appreciate a chance to tell our side of the story if the RACF is leveraging negative outcomes against Friends Helping Friends due to our outspoken political beliefs.
The Unlevel Playing Field Report:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/08/unlevelfield.html
I felt that since the Rochester Area Community Foundation did not understand our organization, they were quick to unfairly and harshly judge our group. We have done everything in our power to resolve this sitation without pursuing litigation we cannot currently afford; we would greatly appreciate your assistance in this matter.
Sincerely,
Andrew Stankevich
Friends Helping Friends