National Nonprofit Day: The local fallout from disrupted federal funding | Adam Jespersen

Across Montana, nonprofits hold the heart and vibrancy of our communities, making them the places we are proud to call home. What would our communities be like without senior centers, museums, theaters, clean lakes and rivers, community parks, economic development associations, chambers of commerce, kids' after-school and summer programs, 4-H clubs, humane societies, PTAs, veterans' groups, and sports clubs?

Nonprofits often partner with government at all levels to strengthen our communities. As locally led organizations, they can deliver services and programs more nimbly and with greater accountability than bureaucratic agencies. Annually, more than $130 million in federal contracts, grants, and loans flows to nonprofits across Montana to deliver essential services our communities depend on.

When this funding is delayed, conditions change suddenly, requirements become overly burdensome, or funding remains uncertain, it becomes difficult for organizations to sustain services that affect their communities. This dysfunction directly threatens nonprofits' ability to do their work — and ultimately, Montana bears the cost.

Over the past 18 months at the federal level, we’ve seen numerous nonprofits face months-long funding delays or abrupt changes to systems and requirements with little explanation and little certainty about what the future might hold. These whipsaw changes have forced longstanding, vital organizations to cut services, lay off staff, or close. This is especially devastating for our most rural communities, where options were already limited and may now be nonexistent. This situation is occurring sector-wide, affecting efforts to combat invasive species, support victims of domestic violence, uplift the arts, make progress on Montana’s housing affordability crisis, and more.

Some of these disruptions have been caused by the indiscriminate cuts to the federal workforce, which have left limited staff to manage grants and payments. Other times, they’ve occurred when unelected bureaucrats introduce partisan politics into the process, often after congressional approval and after contracts have been signed. These decisions have hamstrung important, popular programs and services that have supported communities for decades through many different administrations.

Nonprofits, like all businesses, need to be able to trust contracts and funding processes to be effective, especially when many have already hired staff, signed leases, and built programs around them. This is about honoring the obligations and commitments our government has made — to both nonprofits and, more importantly, to us as citizens.

So, on this National Nonprofit Day, we honor the hard work of the nearly 10,000 nonprofits in Montana and ask our congressional delegation for help.

We, along with 80 nonprofit organizations located across 22 counties and serving the entire state, sent a letter to Sens. Daines and Sheehy and Reps. Downing and Zinke, asking them to protect the stability and timeliness of federal funding that affects programs, services, and communities across Montana and to find ways to get the funding moving. You can read the full letter on our website at mtnonprofit.org.

Please take a moment to contact the delegation and urge them to act. And while you are at it, donate to your favorite nonprofit, sign up for a volunteer shift, or let them know that you appreciate all they do.