What the hell???? I stumbled across this link this morning and damn near sprayed coffee all over my monitor. Here’s is a US Presidential Order (13397) to “expand opportunities for faith-based and other community organizations and to strengthen their capacity to better meet America’s social and community needs”. First and foremost DHS is tasked with creating a “Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives”. This center is supposed to be in effect no less than 45 days from the issuance of the prez order. So look for the new org on April 20th or somewhere thereabout…is it ok for me to cry now?
Sec. 3. Responsibilities of the Center for Faith-Based
and Community Initiatives. In carrying out the purpose
set forth in section 2 of this order, the Center shall:(a) conduct, in coordination with the WHOFBCI
Director, a department-wide audit to identify all
existing barriers to the participation of faith-based
and other community organizations in the delivery of
social and community services by the Department,
including but not limited to regulations, rules,
orders, procurement, and other internal policies and
practices, and outreach activities that unlawfully
discriminate against, or otherwise discourage or
disadvantage the participation of faith-based and other
community organizations in Federal programs;
(b) coordinate a comprehensive departmental effort
to incorporate faith-based and other community
organizations in Department programs and initiatives to
the greatest extent possible;
(c) propose initiatives to remove barriers
identified pursuant to section 3(a) of this order,
including but not limited to reform of regulations,
procurement, and other internal policies and practices,
and outreach activities;
(d) propose the development of innovative pilot and
demonstration programs to increase the participation of
faith-based and other community organizations in
Federal as well as State and local initiatives; and(e) develop and coordinate Departmental outreach
efforts to disseminate information more effectively to
faith-based and other community organizations with
respect to programming changes, contracting
opportunities, and other agency initiatives, including
but not limited to Web and Internet resources.
How is this remotely a DHS issue? Save us Cheebus!
While I am as big a fan of separation of church and state in the US as anyone else, I think you may be missing the fact that DHS has other missions besides border security and anti-terrorism. Notably, disaster relief (FEMA) – and it says “delivery of social and community services” right there. There’s some evidence (see, e.g., this recent posting in WorldChanging for some anecdotal observations about post-Katrina relief efforts) that faith-based NGOs are more effective than the government and their secular peers at actually DOING stuff. Is that the way it should be? No. But to the degree that you believe it is easier to get government out of the way than to fix it, this might actually make sense.