Diversity Drive Threatens Florida Charities

BY BUDDY NEVINS

Political correctness is coming to gift giving.

An activist group wants to tell Florida charities how to spend their money.

This is a scary Holiday story,  perfect for a season when so many give so much out of the goodness of their hearts.  

If the Florida Minority Community Reinvestment Coalition has its way, by next Christmas it would be telling charities how to use your money.  The Coalition wants charities to donate more to minority-led organizations.

The Florida Minority Community Reinvestment Coalition is a motherhood and apple pie name. It’s the kind of name that prompts gushing approval by the mainstream media and very little skepticism.

Let me tell you.  This group is a Trojan Horse threatening the right you have to give your money to whom you choose.

Ideally, the Coalition would like the government to mandate that charities give more to minority-led groups, maybe through the tax laws. Short of that, it wants to pressure the well-meaning philanthropy folks to bow to its wishes.

Just giving money to minority causes isn’t good enough for the Coalition.  No, it has a quota system.

The Coalition report defines minority-led organizations as those where 50 percent of the staff and 50 percent of the Board of Directors are minorities. So worthy groups like the Boys & Girls Clubs of Broward, the United Way and Habitate for Humanities groups that pour millions into the county’s minorities communities wouldn’t qualify.  They don’t meet the quota!

The Coalition’s scheme sounds like a shakedown to me.  And to The Wall Street Journal editorial board, who called the idea “racial extortion” and a “philanthropy shakedown” that appears designed to create nonprofit jobs for minorities.

Am I making too much of this?

Not really.  The Florida Coalition is a partner of Greenlining Institute, a California activist group that has squeezed $30 million out of charities for its handpicked minority-led and community-based groups. Greenlining Institute also has a friendly legislator threatening to pass a law regulating charities. 

The Florida Coalition knows Tallahassee is unlikely to be friendly to calls for regulating charities.  So the Coalition is concentrating on Washington.  And concentrating on pressuring charities. 

Florida charlities better get used to the type of conduct that erupted in January.  That’s when the Coalition’s leaderAl Pina had a fiery public clash with the state’s United Way president because he dared praise Publix Super Markets Charities.

The Coalition had criticized Publix for giving no money to minority led groups, despite its donations of tens of millions to charities active in minority communities. 

The Florida United Way’s president was in Jacksonville to talk about how good Publix had been to the minorities that needed help.  

According to The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Pina tried to hijack the meeting.

“I said, ‘How dare you? How dare you disrespect these people? That was so insensitive,'” Pina told The Chronicle.

Pina since has huffed about a boycott of Publix.

Threats like that can cow big companies like Publix.  And activists like Pina know it.

But the real threat is to donors like you and me.  If Pina and The Coalition has its way, they will be telling us where our money can be spent.

That’s wrong.  You’ve been warned.



8 Responses to “Diversity Drive Threatens Florida Charities”

  1. Mr. Clostein says:

    The Boys & Girls Club of Broward is a whitebread club of rich folks. It needs some diversity.

  2. What Would Reagan Do? says:

    I suppose things got skinny with the expose of ACORN and the temporary interruption of it’s coffers. This would be laughable if it wasn’t so damn possible. These extortionists have plenty of friends in Washington. In the end everyone suffers, including the minorities they PRETEND to care about. These groups are organized crime.

  3. Floridan says:

    Charities shouldn’t need to be pressured — they should invest in minority non-profits.

    It is a form of paternalism (albeit it benign, for the most part) that major donors, such as United Way, prefer to contribute to minority causes through white-run organizations.

  4. disenchanted says:

    shouldnt everyone have the right to drive a mercedese or bmw, where else would they get the money….

  5. James Madison Institute says:

    Virtually all donors want to choose where their money goes. After all, most charitable gifts represent the remaining fruits of their labor after the necessities of life have been paid.

    Learn more about this growing threat to fundamental principles of philanthropy–respect for the donor’s intent—and private property rights:
    JMI Policy Brief “The Future of Philanthropy in Florida”
    http://www.jamesmadison.org/pdf/materials/706.pdf

    FROM BUDDY: A very interesting read!

  6. Floridan says:

    A very interest read, perhaps, but essentially a polemic filled with dubious assertions and contrived examples.

    It’s full of statements such as “It’s but a stone’s throw
    from mandatory race, gender, and ethnicity reporting to
    government directives on how charities should distribute
    their funds.”

    Is this true? This claim reminds me of something my father said during the civil rights era: “If the government can tell you who you have to eat with [via integration of restaurants], before long it will be telling you who you have to marry.”

    The James Madison Institute is a conservative/libertarian organization — it hardly is taking a reflective review of this issue.

  7. Al Pina says:

    You have got to be kidding me. Let me give you a dose of reality. African Americna is most FL urban centers have almost a 30% infant mortality rate, double the unemployement rate as whites and minorities in general only account for less than 5% of Florida’s GDP. This is ecnomics and reality that impacts all Florida. So you can use words to hide the truth or try to intimidate some minority leaders not to be vocal on this but it will not work with us. Diversity data is critical to ensure that there is inclusion and fair access to resources. If our country followed your logic…womenn would still not be able to vote and the civil rights act never would of passed. Minorties are this country’s economic future and it is time to equip them as such.

  8. Nucky Thompson says:

    Mr.Pina is indeed correct. For a start we need to equip the minorities with spellcheck, beginning with Al.