President’s Advisory Council presents proposal to improve the rules regarding faith-based organizations’ partnerships with the government
March 9, 2010
WASHINGTON – A council of religious and secular leaders charged with improving the operations of the White House faith-based office and its partnerships has presented to senior Obama Administration officials recommendations for the office, including a list of 12 proposals that would implement reforms.
The 25 members of President Barack Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships presented more than 60 recommendations from the task force charged with reform of the office and the five other task forces.
The reform of the office task force’s 12 specific recommendations aimed to strengthen the constitutional and legal footing of public-private partnerships by clarifying the prohibited uses of direct financial assistance, providing guidance on the protection of religious identity while providing social services and assuring the religious liberty rights of clients and beneficiaries of federal social service funds.
The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, a strong supporter of church-state separation, also works to defend the free exercise of religion and protect the autonomy of religious organizations. Executive Director J. Brent Walker, who participated in the final council meeting today to present the proposals, served on the task force that drafted the recommendations for reform of the office.
“The reform of the office report goes a long way in righting the church-state problems that have plagued the Faith-based Initiative over the past decade,” Walker said. “I earnestly hope the Administration will adopt all of our recommendations.”
The Council’s recommendations made it clear that regulations and guidance regarding the use of federal social service funds should equally emphasize two requirements. First, any explicitly religious activities offered by a provider must be privately funded, separate in time or location from the government-funded program, and, second, nongovernmental providers that receive federal grant or contract funds may maintain their institutional religious identity.
The final report highlights some disagreement among the 25-member Advisory Council. While agreeing that the government should permit providers to retain certain aspects of their religious identities while providing federally funded social services, “[m]embers of the Council disagree … about whether the Government should allow social services subsidized by Federal grant or contract funds to be provided in rooms that contain religious art, scripture, messages, or symbols” the report states.
Additionally, the Council was split over the issue of whether the government should require houses of worship to form separate corporations, such as 501(c)(3) organizations, to receive federal funding for social services. The measure passed by a vote of 13-12.
Three members of the Advisory Council have direct ties to the Baptist Joint Committee. Its former general counsel, Melissa Rogers, chairs the Council and the task force charged with reform of the office. A fellow co-chair of religious liberty coalitions, Rabbi David Saperstein, is also on the Advisory Council, as well as the Rev. William Shaw, a Baptist Joint Committee Board Member.
The Advisory Council also presented recommendations developed by five other task forces, which included work on economic recovery and domestic poverty; environment and climate change; fatherhood and healthy families; global poverty and development; and interreligious cooperation.
Click here to read the entire report presented to the officials.
Administration officials present included Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services; Melody Barnes, Domestic Policy Director; Raj Shah, USAID administrator; Lisa Jackson, EPA Administrator; and Denis McDonough, National Security Council Chief of Staff.
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The Baptist Joint Committee is a 74-year-old, Washington, D.C.-based religious liberty organization that works to defend and extend God-given religious liberty for all, bringing a uniquely Baptist witness to the principle that religion must be freely exercised, neither advanced nor inhibited by government.
