i L i n d . n e t

Here’s the newly available link to my Honolulu Weekly column published last week, “Money Talks“.

I ran into this interesting situation yesterday.

The Office of Information Practices issued a Opinion No. 06-03 back in May 2006 advising the University of Hawaii that it would have to disclose the number of student athletes who tested positive in drug tests. However, OIP then agreed UH should not disclose a breakdown of sanctions imposed. The OIP opinion came in response to a request for information filed by the Honolulu Advertiser.

But a year later, UH disclosed both the number of positive tests and specific breakdown of penalties imposed, which was incorporated into a larger study of drug use in college athletics by two reporters at the Salt Lake Tribune. Doug White (Poinography.com) flagged the story and also pointed to the information provided by UH.

It isn’t clear to me whether OIP changed its view following the 2006 opinion or whether UH decided it should comply with the request in any case.

Yesterday’s musings drew several replies. Kauai writer Andy Parx was not happy.

I couldn’t disagree more with what looks to me like a pooh-poohing of Rob’s series in your blog today. The connections are there- you can’t say because they have other businesses and interest that the links aren’t there. I can’t understand the logic in that. Yes you can say that if Robbie Alm was on non-profit boards and gave money to the rep in the article he wasn’t giving a legal bribe. You can make all the excuses in the world but those excuses perpetuate the corruption that is there on the face of it…. the connection is not fuzzy to anyone who doesn’t directly benefit from it.

Larry Geller (DisappearedNews.com) jumped in with his own thoughtful observations on the nonprofit world.

The whole non-profit scene could benefit from a series of audits, I think. There’s much more than state money involved– tons of federal money comes in to Hawaii and is farmed out to non-profits without oversight. I have my pet organizations, and suspect that if anyone took a look at the situation (which means not going by their self-reports) a huge bucket of worms would be opened up.

One of the next questions might be something like how to put our tax money to work in the most effective way. The work might still need to be done, but how, by whom, and with what oversight? How are decisions made on who gets the millions in federal funds that come in to Hawaii? (Hint: I believe the administration decides.)

Jeff has his particular focus. I have mine. I’ve worked in or near non-profits for some time, and many do great work on nearly no money at all, while others suck up an astounding amount of money for little product (in my humble opinion) and high executive salaries. So the ED benefits year after year after year. With no external audit to say that the taxpayers and private funders are getting their money’s worth, it is a self-perpetuating machine.

An interesting addendum to this is that often private foundations don’t care if their money is effectively used, as long as they give it away for a defined purpose. I think we see that in Hawaii also. There was a Stanford study that astounded me. While many funders do work closely with the organizations they fund, many pay no attention whatsoever to what happens with the money they have given. Now, because many non-profits are funded by government year after year, they are able to attract this additional private money, without much accountability.

Rob Perez’ articles are a very good start. There is certainly more that could be said, but I suspect there would be fierce resistance to investigating and possibly endangering the good work that non- profits are engaged in, or to attacking them with investigative audits (and that’s what it would take, their self-generated reports are often quite glowing).

Enough said on that topic for this morning.

UH student media advisor Jay Hartwell called my attention recently to the new Hawaii Publisher’s Association web site.

According to the accompanying press release:

For right now, we have added:
1. A member directory by Publication name, with links to all of our member websites.
2. Email casting for general enews and upcoming events to members
3. Complete descriptions & info on all HPA events.
4. In-depth Hawaii & General Media Resources. A great value for our members and viewers.
5. HPA Invitation to Join and Membership applications in PDF format to print and send in.
6. Online access to the proof sheet, the new one to be added as soon as it is complete.
7. Complete List of 2006 Winners for Pa’i Awards and HS Journalism Awards
8. Photo Album Pages - Archiving the fun and history of the organization.