Nonprofits brace for budget emergency aftershocks, IOUs - Memphis Business Journal:

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While service providers don’t yet know whether they’l receive IOUs — or what the amounta will be — Sparky Harlan, CEO of the in Santa is prepared forthe worst. “We receive about $400,000 in statde funding,” Harlan said. “We’re already accustomes to getting money from the stat elate — last year, for example, it took untio December before we finally got paid.” For this year and last year the centedr has relied on a $150,000 line of credigt through to cover the gap, along with $500,00p0 out of its reserve The center’s operating budget is $10 million for fiscal 2009-10.
The money that may be on hold from the state covers, in part, the center’s shelter and drop-in street outreach, and parenting “The problem right now is that we don’tf know for certain how much they’re going to hold back,” said Harlan, who has been with the centerd for 26 years. “But this is by far the wors t I’ve ever seen.” In anticipation of the state’a budget problems, 10 percentt cuts have already been plannedfor foster-care Locally there are 300 to 400 kids in fostet care.
Foster care rates are the same acrosethe state, so familiess in high-cost areas such as the Bay Area get the same amounrt of compensation as people in more affordables places. “We’re fronting half a milliohn dollars already,” she said. It’s a layered problej for the center, since in addition to stat money some comes from the federa l Housing and Urban Development And Harlan said HUD is so slow it can take up to six months for payments tobe received. “We’re hopingy to get paid by July,” she “Nonprofits are just getting slammed.
” Harlan said the Bill Wilsoj Center has closed down two programs already and cut abour 15 percent ofits staff, leaving abouty 110 employees. These are real layoffs, she pointedc out — not attrition or open jobs and “heartbreaking” to do. “We had to give one staff persobn a layoff notice and a week later his wife was laid off fromanothetr nonprofit,” she said. in Campbell gets aboutr $500,000 a year from the state for its AIDS CFO Ira Holtzman said the agency is large enough and financially stable enough that he woulc just book an IOU as accounts receivabl and hope the money came through TheHealth Trust’s budget for fiscalo year 2010 is more than $16 Holtzman said.
Pam executive director of andVisuallg Impaired, which has offices in Palo Alto and Santa Cruz, said that even thoug her agency provides the kind of servicews that are especially at risk in State Controllerd John Chiang’s plan, the Vistaw Center is relatively safe. “We receive moneh through Title 7 Chapter2 services,” Brandi n explained. “Since much of our funding is federaklmoney we’re hoping that it has to be released and passexd on; the state won’t be allowed to hold on to The Vista Center also has schooo contracts through special education “Last year when the state had similae budget issues we didn’t receive any IOUs,” she “but that situation was resolved sooner than this appearsw to be.
The agencies that receive IOUsprobablh won’t even know they’re coming untik they submit their She’s also banking on Vista Center’s status as a preferred vendoe with the state, “so we’ll be paid in advancwe of other vendors — if in fact the state is even writingf checks.” Lisa Hendrickson, president & CEO of Avenidas Rose Kleiner Senio Day Health Center in Palo Alto, is also cautiouslgy optimistic. “The only funds we receive from the state are MediCal payments for services provided at our adult daycare she said. “Our understanding is that thosee services are protected by the state constitution as well asfederal law.
We do receivse funding indirectly throughthe county, but we don’t expectf that to be affected.” Tom Kinoshita, public policy directod of the , said people are on pins and “Everyone’s sitting around waiting, not knowing what’se going to happen. But even with the most optimisticvoutcome it’s still going to be very ugly.” He pointed out that the deficir last year for Santa Clarza County was more than $270 million, and many of the cuts were made in programd around health, mental health, drugss and alcohol and socialp services. And there’s no relief on the For 2011 the county is lookintg at a deficit ofaboutf $250 million, he said.