Agencies can appeal cuts, but ...

There will be appeals.

They likely will fail.

United Way officials acknowledged the former and hinted at the latter while answering Observer questions before this week's agency cuts were made public.

"Yes, there will be many agencies who will appeal," said Michael Smith, head of Center City Partners and a United Way of Central Carolinas volunteer. That's to be expected given that the United Way cut money to agencies by an average of 35 percent - with one-fifth of agencies seeing program dollars cut by 50 percent or more.

But, warns United Way official Chris Jackson, the bar for a successful appeal will be high: "It's really got to be a fundamentally poor decision from the council, or they were using some incorrect data."

Says Andy Elliott, head of the committee of volunteers who decided how the money would be spent: "It's not as if we put aside money for appeals."

Agencies have two weeks to make a formal protest.

After the bad news - a challenge

When the United Way email finally arrived yesterday morning, Carson Dean seemed relieved. It wasn't that his Uptown Shelter for men was spared by funding cuts - in fact, three of his programs lost half their money. "We were bracing for the worst," he says. "What we ended up getting was kind of what we were expecting."

The cuts to Uptown Men's Shelter reflected United Way's larger philosophy this year: critical needs, such as Dean's emergency shelter, were largely spared. Other programs, such as the Uptown Shelter's substance abuse, mental health and transitional housing program, suffered.

"At the end of the day," says Dean, "that's probably fair."

But while few are questioning the United Way's funding priorities - yet - yesterday's announcement was a reminder of its limitations. Less than a third of United Way funded agencies tackle emergency needs such as homelessness, and even those get much of their money elsewhere.

At Uptown Shelter, United Way money and county support account for only a third of the budget. The rest comes from private donors, including churches, and those givers are struggling in this harsh economy.

Meanwhile, the shelter is filled to its 268-bed capacity each night, as is its sibling year-round shelter, the Salvation Army's Center of Hope for women and children. About 5,000 others are on the streets.

There's a need not only for beds, but for programs that will get people off the street and out of the shelter. Yesterday's cuts made a difficult task a little harder.

So why relief? Because Dean now knows what he's working with. He says he'll redouble his efforts for private donations. And now, oddly, the United Way cuts have created a crisis that's focused the community on need, perhaps more than ever.

"We have to figure out how to overcome it," Dean says. "That's our next challenge."

From our media partners:

WFAE-FM 90.7 looks at some of the impact of the United Way cuts on emergency needs. Mike Collins will talk at 9 a.m. today about slashes in the state budget with the Observer's Mark Johnson and Dr. Gary Rassel, Assoc. Professor of Political Science at UNC Charlotte.

Davidsonnews.net offers the Mooresville-Lake Norman perspective on the cuts.

Who took the hardest United Way hits (and who didn't)

In a harsh economic climate, Mecklenburg agencies serving the county's most urgent needs were largely spared significant United Way cuts today. Programs serving less-critical needs took most of the hardest hits.

"We are underinvesting on things that are long-term solutions to the problem in exchange for dealing with the problem," United Way chairman Carlos Evans said yesterday in advance of releasing the cuts. "Unfortunately, we're in crisis mode."

The hardest-hit programs/agencies, in dollars:

-$358,299: Boy Scouts of America, Mecklenburg Council, outreach/special initiatives (-60.1%)
-$327,428: YMCA Strong Kids (-50%)
-$310,829: Salvation Army Boys and Girls Clubs (-45%)
-$299,463: YWCA Mecklenburg Neighborhood Youth Programs (-45%)
-$254,892: Metrolina Association for the Blind (-57.1%)

Hardest-hit programs/agencies, by percentage lost:

-100%: Substance Abuse Prevention Services, Adult prevention program, (-$83,198)
-79.4%: Sandra & Leon Levine Jewish Center, leisure, (-$83,174)
-77.8%: Legal Services of Southern Piedmont, legal services for elderly (-$7,000)
-70%: YMCA, Strong Communities Latino outreach, (-$23,254)
-60.1%: Boy Scouts of America, Mecklenburg Council, outreach/special initiatives (-$358,299)

Programs/agencies with an increase or no cuts:

+4.9%: Salvation Army Center of Hope shelter for women and children (received $824,000)
0.0%: MedAssist of Mecklenburg (received $233,996)
0.0%: Charlotte Community Health Clinic, chronic disease management (received $129,308)
0.0%: Crisis Assistance Ministry Free Store (received $82,600)

(Here's a PDF of all the funding allocations for the United Way of Central Carolinas, including agencies in Anson, Cabarrus, Mecklenburg and Union counties - and the Mooresville-Lake Norman area. Here's a searchable database.)

A couple of caveats: United Way listed its 2009 allocations by larger agencies' programs or smaller agencies as a whole. Although the Boy Scouts of Mecklenburg outreach initiatives program took the largest single program cut of $358,299, other agencies received more total cuts. The largest: YMCA of Mecklenburg lost a total of $531,329.

Also, not included above are agencies which lost 100 percent of their money because they are no longer United Way members.

United Way officials tell us a number of factors went into decisions made by the Citizen Review Process, the volunteers who analyzed the programs asking for money.

The CRP took into consideration whether an agency had other financial support (which would include larger agencies, such as the Boy Scouts, YMCA and YWCA, that received some of the biggest cuts).

Another factor: Officials didn't want to cripple smaller agencies, because needs remained and the startup costs to address those needs are significant.

The biggest apparent factor: "We said this year it's critical needs and it's more short-term oriented," said Andy Elliott, Regional Community Investment Committee Chair.

That means shelters such as the Salvation Army's Center of Hope shelter for women and children and the Uptown Shelter emergency facility (12.9 percent cut) received far less than the average 35 percent cut. Also spared were some agencies and programs that provide urgent medical needs, such as MedAssist and the chronic disease management program at Charlotte Community Health Clinic.

United Way defined critical programs as those meeting needs for "basic services to sustain life." The next tier - "pressing" - were programs meeting needs that, if not met, could become critical within six months. "Important" programs provided indirect services or met underlying needs not expected to quickly become critical.

Critical programs received an average of 20.3% in cuts today. Pressing programs were cut 32.8%, and Important programs 43.3 percent.

Are you involved in a program that was cut? Let us know what it means for your agency - or you personally.