ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, April 11, 1996 TAG: 9604110055
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
NOTE: Below
The tinkle of Salvation Army bells - in the spring?
The Salvation Army Roanoke Corps is prepared to revisit the winter holiday tradition next month in an effort to close a widening financial gap.
The executive and financial committees of the organization's advisory board on Wednesday decided to devote National Salvation Army Week, May 13-19, to raising money, said Maj. Dan Delaney, commander of the Roanoke Corps. That may include placing bell ringers with kettles on street corners as the organization does during the winter holiday season, he said.
"We'll send letters out to folks, put some banners up, maybe even have bell ringers - just to remind people we're still alive," Delaney said.
Delaney said the organization is about $100,000 in the hole - because of harsh winter weather, sagging thrift-store sales and the loss of a federal emergency shelter grant.
"It's given us a triple whammy," Delaney said. "One hundred thousand dollars is a lot to us. It's $100,000 we don't have."
In 1995, the Salvation Army provided 647,212 "units of service" - meals served, clothing distributed, nights of lodging. So far this year, the organization has provided 870,647 units, with roughly five months to go before its budget year ends Sept. 30, Delaney said.
Harsh winter weather increased requests for help and cut into the Salvation Army's finances, Delaney said, causing it to spend more than it had budgeted.
Thrift store sales have been sagging, in part because of the weather, Delaney said. The Salvation Army's four thrift stores have brought in about $282,301. They were budgeted to have raised $294,000 by now.
Add to that the loss of a $32,000 federal grant that helped fund the Salvation Army's two shelters - the Red Shield Lodge for men and the Turning Point shelter for battered women and their children.
For more than 10 years, the Salvation Army had received the grant, which came from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and was funneled through the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. HUD also gives emergency shelter grants directly to what it calls "entitlement" areas - nine Virginia localities, including Roanoke, with a need for shelter services.
Last year, the state Department of Housing and Community Development chose not to use its share of the federal money to fund individual agency grant requests in entitlement areas, said Robert Richards, deputy director of the department.
Consequently, the Salvation Army Roanoke Corps, as well as Salvation Army corps in other state entitlement areas, lost the funding.
"It doesn't seem to make sense to take from our share and put back into areas where people already got money from the federal government," Richards said.
The Salvation Army could have applied to Roanoke for a portion of the city's emergency shelter grant funding. But by the time Delaney discovered that the Salvation Army would not be receiving the grant, the city already had earmarked it for other programs, he said.
The Salvation Army receives funding from a variety of sources - the United Way of Roanoke Valley; Salvation Army constituents; the thrift stores; and federal, state and local governments.
A little less than half of the organization's budget - $860,489 of a $1.9 million budget this year - comes from donations, most of it given between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That money is used first to pay for the organization's Christmas distribution to needy families. What's left is used for emergency family relief - utility payments, food, medicine - anything to help people in need get through the winter months, Delaney said.
"The problem is this year we spent a lot more than we normally spent and normally budgeted," he said. "That's the fix we're in. It means that sometime in the next few months we're going to run out of money."
"There's still money to operate now. But when summer comes ..."
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