More Money, Please

I'm often tardy in my reading, but sometimes I get a special pleasure out of something enlightening in the ancient stack of "to do". A case in point is an essay entitled "What Should a Billionaiire Give and What Should You?" by Peter Singer, first published in The New York Times magazine of December 17, 2006. (And reprinted in The Best American Essays of 2007.) In this thoughtful piece, Singer reviews the history of philanthropy in the United States in an effort to answer the questions: what is philanthropy, who are the philanthropists, how are they different from people who aren't wealthy, and what are their motives for giving away their fortunes? He's done his homework, so there's a healthy amount of information to review, but he's also done some deep thinking about giving. Singer is a philosopher, so he thinks about ideas from the viewpoint of "what is true and how do we know its true," and perhaps more importantly, "what is right"? I find his answers provocative. Also, he's a clear and energetic writer.

Grant screw up causes New Jersey to lose $400 million

In an August 26th report in The New York Times, Sharon Otterman wrote: "The state (New Jersey) was drenched in recriminations...as Governor Chris Christie said a clerical error by a midlevel official had caused the state to lose out on $400 million in federal school reform money - an error that caused its Race to the Top grant application to fall short of the 10-member winner's circle by just three points."

Recriminations were flying in an attempt by the state's largest teacher union and school districts to discredit the governor. They claim that the real failure was "the governor's for not securing the support from a large number of school disrtricts, a point specifically cited by some evaluators as a weakness that cost more points than the clerical error."

The clerical error was on just one page of a 1,000 page application.

The story becomes even more political, with the republican governor and others blaming the Obama adminsitration for not calling "or checking the state's Web site when it discovered the error."

"It was an ignominious end to a process that had already been marred by broken agreements and name-callling between the state government and New Jersey's [teachers]."

Because of factors that left the governor up against the deadline - he had "little more than the Memorial Day weekend to complete a new version of the application, which was due that Tuesday. In the end, only one person was assigned to review the checklist for the 700-page appendix to the grant application. The governor said that "with an application of such magnitude, in the future two people will be assigned to the task."

"It was a stunning error," the Assembly Appropriations Committee announced. It will hold an inquiry into how the mistake happened.

Comment: It might have been a case of death by clerk.

Cherry Lane

The depression continues to deliver a body blow to the country's arts non-profits. Most recently I read of the Cherry Lane Theatre in Greenwich Village. This is a veneralbe arts icon. From its beginning in 1924, it has attracted the top writing talent of the day: F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Dos Passos, Edward Albee, Harold Pinter. I can remember the names associated with the Theatre in the 60s and 70s, people who went on to have careers in television and film, starting on the tiny stage on Commerce Street. John Malkowich, Bob Dylan, Harvey Keitel, Sam Shepard.

Because of a loss of donation income, the Theatre has been forced to close indefinitely. This economic disaster is leaving so many dead in their tracks.