The Daily Tell

The U.S. Census Bureau on Monday launched a canvassing operation to verify addresses for the decennial census.

Secretary of commerce Gary Locke will make remarks Wednesday at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on the administrations efforts to ensure that all Latinos will be counted in the 2010 Census.

"A complete and accurate address list is the cornerstone of a successful census," said Tom Mesenbourg, acting director of the U.S. Census Bureau. "Building on the achievements of the 2000 Census, we have been testing and preparing for the 2010 count all decade and we’re ready to fulfill our constitutional mandate to count everyone living in the United States."

Address canvassing is ahead of schedule and should conclude by mid-July, the bureau said. The operation will use new hand-held computers equipped with GPS to increase geographic accuracy and cut down on coding errors caused by using paper maps in previous counts.

Over the last several years, the Census Bureau has been a preparing for the 2010 Census, setting up 151 local census offices across the U.S. This is the first census to include group quarters such as dormitories, group homes, prisons and homeless shelters in the address canvassing operation, which should improve both the accuracy and coverage of the final count.

2010 Census workers will never ask for bank or social security information. All census information collected, including addresses, are confidential and protected by law and will not be shared with any other government agency.

Historically, the U.S. Census Bureau has had a poor track record of enumerating the growing Latino community, according to the NALEO Education Fund. In 2000, the Census undercounted Latinos by one million, or 3 percent.

A major wireless carrier announced it is teaming up with a nonprofit group to promote safer online behavior among young people who may be exploited on the internet.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) and telecom company Sprint today released a new website to help educate tweens (children aged 8 to 12) about staying safe while gaming online and connecting with others through the web.

The resources made available are available for free on NSTeens.org, an internet safety tool sponsored by Sprint and created by NCMEC’s NetSmartz Workshop. NSTeens.org is funded through Sprint Project Connect, Sprint’s phone-recycling program.

"Twenty-five years ago when the National Center first started, we wanted to help families understand the risks that their children faced and make it easier for them to have conversations about safety. The Internet, and the advent of online gaming and social networking have not changed that core mission," said NCMEC president and CEO Ernie Allen.

About 97 percent of teens ages 12-17 play computer, web, portable or console games and 27 percent play games with people through the internet, including more than a quarter of those teens that play with people they don’t know in real life, according to research from the Pew Internet and American Life Project indicates that.

The NSTeens website teaches kids about online harassment, etiquette and the dangers of sharing too much information. The site’s applications use animated characters to model safer online practices and materials for adults are designed to educate parents about internet safety.

NSTeens content also addresses cyberbullying, safer social networking and the offline consequences of online actions, the groups said.

Can switching to paperless billing for a credit card, bank statement and even utility bills help save the environment?

According to consumer education association PayItGreen, households reducing paper billing can have a significant impact on the environment.

But PayItGreen really extols the impact that businesses can have on the environment and their own carbon footprint by giving employees access to direct deposit.

The benefits to society and the environment are impressive, says PayItGreen. The organization, a coalition of financial services companies, estimates that 22 million employed Americans do not have access to direct deposit to receive their pay electronically.

If they did, says the group, nearly 9 million pounds of paper would be saved and 25 million pounds of greenhouse gases would not be released into the environment.

"What large and small companies don’t realize is that by offering direct deposit and maximizing participation, they not only are helping to save the environment, they are also saving their companies significant money," said Angela Ceccarelli, PayItGreen spokesperson and vice president of marketing for HSBC Payments and Cash Management in New York.

A 2009 study by PayItGreen shows that businesses save well over $6.5 billion over the last 10 years by switching employee payment to direct deposit.

Because Earth Day is coming up at the end of the month, now is the opportune time for companies to study environmental best practices and try to make small or large-scale changes to save the environment and save money, advocates the group.

In addition to the eco-friendly reasons for going paperless, PayItGreen says that direct deposit and other electronic payment methods reduces clutter, saves time and improves security.

Nonprofits are feeling the pain of the ongoing recession as fewer charitable donations are being made.

But as the federal government allocates millions in stimulus funds to states, businesses and individuals nationwide, new legislation is aimed at bringing service back to life as well.

Last week the Senate passed the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, intended to help spur volunteerism and encourage Americans to give back to the community.

Senator Barbara Mikulski who had a hand in bringing the bill before Congress said, "This is a public investment that will pay dividends long beyond anything we can imagine."

According to Senator Kennedy, the bill is a significant step beyond existing national and community-based service programs.

The timing of the bill is crucial, say Senators Hatch and Enzi who joined Mikulski and Kennedy in crafting and bringing the legislation before the Senate. Despite the worst economic period in recent history, Americans still want to serve their country and need to know how to give back, they said.

"The passage of the Serve America Act is a significant milestone for our country. By increasing opportunities nationwide for Americans to serve and, thus, enabling private citizens to do more for their communities, personal and community responsibility will take the place of direct government aid," said Senator Hatch.

The bill will create programs that address a number needs including education. New tactics to address the dropout crisis and to generally strengthen the school systems are included in the legislation.

Serve America Act also creates a Summer of Service program aimed to encourage young adults to partake in community service and an Encore Fellowships giving older Americans the opportunity to serve the country.

After being passed by the Senate last week the bill moved on to the House where it was approved on Tuesday. It will soon land on President Obama’s desk to be signed into law.

Brandeis University recently received funding to found the new Brandeis Genesis Institute for Russian-speaking Jewry.

The $10.8 million grant from the Genesis Philanthropy Group (GPG) will both establish the institute and also create scholarships for undergraduate and graduate students at Brandeis University.

The Genesis institute aims to educate and aid Russian-speaking university students. Attendees and members will also complete community outreach projects, help to recruit new students and organize conferences or extra-curricular activities.

The GPG is ultimately "committed to ensuring that Jewish culture, heritage and values are preserved among Russian-speaking Jews worldwide," said Stan Polovets, chief executive officer and board member of GPG, who further explained that GPG staff expressed delight at the arrangement.

The grant funds will also cover scholarships for 36 to 60 undergraduate and 14 graduate students, plus six doctoral candidates. Around 132 high school students in Brandeis summer programs will also benefit from the GPG donation.

Scholarships awarded to graduate students will be reserved for master’s candidates in the Hornstein Jewish Professional Leadership Program, of which many graduates become leaders of Jewish organizations.

Brandeis professor Leonard Saxe expressed his enthusiasm for the new initiative, explaining that "the Hornstein Program is excited to be able to train a cadre of communal leaders who can bring Russian culture and expertise to the Jewish community."

Brandeis university officials have united over this grant, anticipating its positive ramifications for both the current student body but also the future of Jewish leadership. President Jehuda Reinharz feels the program will expand the university’s "commitments to diversity, to an ever-widening global perspective, and to serving the Jewish community."

Similarly, Daniel Terris, Brandeis associate vice president for global affairs, said the GPG grant would "build strong connections for Brandeis around the world."

The nonprofit Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) recently awarded research grants of $1.5 million each to 50 handpicked early career scientists.

This bold move not only presents each scientist with funding, a salary and benefits, but also the freedom to pursue groundbreaking research – an oft intended direction for eager faculty and scientists at the beginning of establishing their career.

HHMI selected its 50 early career scientists via a competition, inviting emerging scientists from fields including biology, physics and computer science to apply for the six-year, non-renewable grant.

The final team is comprised of 41 men and 9 women, hailing from schools like Stanford, Massachusetts Medical School and Columbia University.

Many scientists receive “start-up” funding during their initial independent lab work, yet inevitably become too concerned with raising money for complicated research. They are frequently forced to abandon projects in search of grant money.

HHMI’s philanthropic investment of $200 million in this program is intended to eliminate these scientists’ financial struggles and instead inspire innovative research.

Prior to their win, each member of the group worked on many challenging problems such as developing stem cell models to slow neurodegenerative disease or examining genes that affect regeneration in flatworms. HHMI staff “hope that [the scientists] will continue to do something really original” with their research, vice president Jack Dixon stated.

The young scientists are “at the early stage of their careers when they are full or energy and not afraid to try something new,” observes Dixon, and eventually their work will provide a valuable benefit to society.

HHMI says it believes strongly in advancing research to better society. The institution’s grant money reached $83 million in 2008.

There has been talk recently that as news organizations continue to struggle to sell papers they would be forced into nonprofit status to survive. But one online media conglomerate is deciding to proactively create a nonprofit fund to staff reporters for its next venture.

The Huffington Post, a popular online news organization, announced this week it had created the Huffington Post Investigative Fund with help from the Atlantic Philanthropies.

In a post on the news site, Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington said the aim of the new venture would be two-fold – to create jobs for journalists who have been laid off or forced into retirement and to investigate what she calls "the multiple crises we are living through."

Huffington says the work of the new fund will be available in a number of ways and will stay true to the web’s open-source philosophy.

"The pieces developed by the Fund will range from long-form investigations to short breaking news stories and will be presented in a variety of media, including text, audio and video," she writes. "And, in the open source spirit of the web, all of the content the Fund produces will be free for anyone to publish."

It is no secret that Huffington and her website have a left-leaning slant, but the fund’s executive director Nick Penniman told the New York Times earlier this week that when it comes to the new venture there will be no room for partisanship which will only discredit the new outlet.

"We care about democracy, not Democrats," he told the paper.

Huffington says the fund will start with a $1.75 million budget and expects to continue raising money and expanding the project into the future.

While a number of organizations are struggling during the recession a new report finds that 51 percent of community foundations are increasing funding for human services assistance in 2009.

According to the Council on Foundations the majority of community foundations report that they will maintain or increase grantmaking from donor advised funds to address human service needs this year.

Steve Gunderson, president and CEO of the Council on Foundations, said that community foundations fill an important role during the current economic crisis.

"Community Foundations continue to focus on and meet the needs of their communities during this economic crisis," he said. "Today, donor advised funds represent the most popular tool of their citizens to support these needs. Our study shows that a majority of these funds plan to maintain or increase their giving in the next year, which again defines the power of community engagement in community need."

The Council on Foundation says that there are more than 700 community foundations across the U.S. which receive funding from the residents of that area. In general these foundations range in size from $2.3 billion in assets to less than $100,000.

In 2007, the council estimates that community foundations donated $4.1 billion to nonprofit agencies in a number of fields around the nation. Last year $1.7 billion – 56 percent of the community foundations’ grant dollars – of donations came from donor advised funds.

In an attempt to increase these numbers, the Council on Foundations is supporting legislation which would allow people to make donations to charitable organizations from the retirement accounts. If passed, the new law would allow individuals aged 59 and a half or older to make tax-free contributions of up to $100,000 from their IRAs to charitable organizations.

Despite an ongoing economic downturn, U.S. grantmaking foundations increased giving in 2008, growing 2.8 percent to an estimated $45.6 billion.

That’s according to the Foundation Growth and Giving Estimates: Current Outlook 2009 from the Foundation Center which was released today.

The report did find that the economy caused a number of organizations to cut down on their giving in the last year. In the 2008 report, 29 percent of foundations reported they expected to reduce giving, but today’s survey finds that the actual number that cut funding was 47 percent.

At a time when many organizations are in flux because of the state of the economy, Foundation Center president Bradford K. Smith says foundations remain an important part of the nonprofit industry. But like most, these organizations are struggling during the recession.

"Foundations remain one of the few sources of stability for nonprofit organizations in this very volatile economic climate," he said. "However, the longer this crisis persists, the more foundations will have to reduce giving."

The 2009 outlook predicts that giving will decrease in 2009 by as much as the low double digit range. However, the drop should not be as high as the estimated 21.9 percent decline of foundation assets in 2008 as a result of the economic situation.

In an attempt to stem the tide of the recession, the Foundation Center has established a Focus on the Economic Crisis area on the organization’s website. The site features podcasts, video, maps, interviews and resources to other organizations that it hopes will help nonprofits make it through the economic downturn.

In gathering its figures, the Foundation Center surveyed 1,225 large and mid-sized foundations in the U.S.

Wireless technology is helping to advance many industries around the world and with a $45 million donation, one foundation is hoping to advance health and well-being.

This week the Gary and Mary West Foundation announced it was donating $45 million to help create the West Wireless Health Institute, a San Diego-based medical research foundation which is exploring the ability to use wireless technologies to advance healthcare.

One of the ways the institute hopes to use wireless technology to improve healthcare and make it safer and more effective is by changing the way vital signs of patients is monitored, said Dr. Eric J. Topol, chief academic officer at Scripps Health and holder of the Gary and Mary West Chair of Innovative Medicine.

"The rapid and remarkable progress in wireless sensors – continuously tracking important parameters such as blood sugar, blood pressure, all vital signs, sleep state and even caloric intake and expenditure – has the potential to change medicine in a radical and unprecedented way," said Topol.

"Not only does this fit the optimal models of individualized and consumer-driven health care, but there is tremendous potential to upgrade quality of care, reduce the cost burden and shift away from reactive to preventive medicine," he said.

The institute is still in the process of looking for a CEO to run the organization and hopes to use its start-up money to encourage and enable companies and inventors to use wireless technology to help make improvements in the healthcare industry.

According to the institute’s website, its primary focus areas will be preempting diseases, disease management, aging in place and underserved population.

In addition to the donation from the Gary and Mary West Foundation, the institute has partnered with Scripps Health as a founding healthcare affiliate and Qualcomm as a founding sponsor.