Salvation Can Wait

Joan Kroc, the widow of Ray Kroc who brought the world the inexpensive meal, a.k.a. the Big Mac, left $1.8 billion to the Salvation Army to erect 30 lavish community centers around the country. The Salvation Army, a revered church and charity, has been unable to manage the funds effectively.

Now only four centers have been completed, two scheduled to open later this year and 5 more next year. The Salvation Army blames the economic climate for the loss of 14% of the gift (about $126 million). As a result, the Army has required communities to raise a total of $628 million nationally. To date they've raised only 34% of that amount, or $214 million.

There is trouble everywhere. From Detroit, MI to Salem, OR, the Army is having trouble raising money. There is some hope to resurrect part of the original plan. A major donor has pledged to line up 18 other large donors to paydown a proposed $48 million loan to cover the amount the Army requires to continue, with the remainder coming from a grass-roots fund-raising effort. But the plan was rejected by the leadership of the Army because the "legal and practical obstacles were too high".

Donors are telling Army officials that they prefer to support the Army's more traditional mission of serving basic needs.

One leader of the Kroc fund-raising committee blamed internal Army squabbling for the cancellation of the center in Detroit. Now the Army is in the position of having to turn down donors, such as $250,000 in gifts from the Detroit Black McDonald's Owners. A big protest is planned for Chicago.

The Salvation Army has shown greater flexibility toward fund-raising goals in some areas, allowing some to split their campaign into three phases. A site has been cleared and holes dug for three swimming pools as envisioned by Mrs. Kroc. Funds still to be raised to continue the building.

In the end, it's a familiar song: "Some folks are less capable of giving because of investment returns and asset values being less, but they still want to hear from us. Some are saying not now, but that's not no forever."

Let's hope not because we need help.

Toiling At Windmills

Marketing and Innovation, said to be the foundation blocks of a successful business, require creative thinking. But when thought is cornered and beat to a pulp, it feels a little dangerous to think. And when creativity is burned alive, or worse, ignored into an ice age of frozen regard, you are easily dissuaded. But if it were easy, everyone would do it and those among us who are courageous (are there any here?) wouldn't bother. I think of courage like a child thinks of courage: explorers, scientists, generals - all working under terrible mental and physical conditions with the aim of carrying on despite the odds. And they are rarely self conscious about it, until after, if they survive and in the comfort of the cottage in the country or their Frank Lloyd Wright - inspired glass house on a cliff over looking a turbulent sea. I don't want to even think about myself in these ranks. But, if you want to explore it through the eyes of an eccentric who leaves no prisoners, in short, a courageous man with a pen, you could do no better than to look up Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey. I especially enjoyed "The End of General Gordon." Now there was a hero!