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ACORN’s Dilemma and Ours

Posted on by Rick Cohen

Quick, what’s the difference between Triantafilitsa Mattfeld and Dale Rathke?

Both were caught embezzling money from their nonprofit organizations, Mattfeld $180,000 from the Navy Elementary School PTA in Fairfax County, Virginia, Rathke exactly $948,607.50 while he was handling the books for ACORN, the nation’s premier community-based organizing and advocacy network founded by his brother Wade Rathke who also served until June as ACORN’s Chief Organizer.

Both reached agreements with their organizations to make some sort of financial restitution, Mattfeld pledging $75,000 after having put an additional $80,000 back into the PTA’s accounts in the previous five years, Rathke’s family making $30,000 a year payments since 2001, for a total of $210,000 according to the New York Times with an anonymous donor pledging to pay the remaining balance.

The Secret of “Profitable” Nonprofits

Posted on by The Editors

Does your primary funding source largely determine your “profitability (ability to produce an operating surplus) and your liquidity (ability to maintain usable reserves)? Does funding diversity really make for a more sustainable nonprofit? What does owning your building do to your organization’s liquidity over the succeeding decade? These are the questions that Clara Miller of

Negotiating Diversity in Foundation-land and What it Means for the Rest of Us

Posted on by Rick Cohen

As we predicted in the summer issue of the Nonprofit Quarterly and in the Financial Times, the California state legislature and the state’s biggest private foundations struck a deal to scuttle the looming legislative mandate (Assembly Bill 624) that large foundations report on their grantmaking to racially diverse communities and minority-led nonprofits. The deal was struck away from the public spotlight and announced on June 24th.

Negotiating Diversity in Foundation-land and What it Means for the Rest of Us

Posted on by Rick Cohen

As we predicted in the summer issue of the Nonprofit Quarterly and in the Financial Times, the California state legislature and the state’s biggest private foundations struck a deal to scuttle the looming legislative mandate (Assembly Bill 624) that large foundations report on their grantmaking to racially diverse communities and minority-led nonprofits. The deal was struck away from the public spotlight and announced on June 24th.

“Greenlining” Foundation Grantmaking: Racial Equality Reporting in California

Posted on by Rick Cohen

Remember when the Atlanta Journal–Constitution published a pathbreaking series on racial discrimination in awarding home mortgages? The Color of Money won a Pulitzer1 and put juice into community-based organizations, academics, and newspapers uncovering patterns of racial discrimination—or redlining—in bank mortgage and home improvement lending practices. Just as the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) requires banks to report on their mortgages and loans, should philanthropic redlining in U.S. philanthropy be remedied by a mandatory reporting regime?

Nonprofit Quarterly | Civic News. Empowering Nonprofits. Advancing Justice.
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