Veterans administration continues to implement 'faith-based' programs

In a push to implement the "faith-- based" initiative, officials with the U.S. Veterans Administration are shifting funds to religiously affiliated organizations and moving to drop regulations that require religious groups to maintain nondiscrimination policies.

In a recent interview with The Roundtable, Peter H. Dougherty, director of the VA's programs for homeless veterans, said a recent review of VA regulations uncovered a policy stating that groups contracting with the VA could not discriminate on the basis of religion.

"Obviously, some religious oriented organizations wanted to have people of the same religious belief. We did not find that that would interfere with their ability to provide service to veterans, and so we are deleting that provision in the new regulations," Dougherty said.

Dougherty also said the VA is changing its funding formula from a contract basis to a per-diem payment. Under the latter approach, the VA will be obligated to work with non-profit groups and presumably more "faith-based" organizations. Dougherty noted that in the most recent funding cycle, 40 percent of the money went to faith-based organizations.

"It was a higher percentage than in the past," he said. "We found that a higher percentage of faith-based organizations were in the per them round of funding. Part of that is because many of the faithbased organizations already seem to have access to property and good locations to provide service, and they simply needed service dollars."

Dougherty denied the VA is intentionally trying to shift more funding to faithbased groups. But some critics have their doubts. Recently, officials at a shelter for homeless veterans in Northampton, Mass., charged that they had been denied federal money because the aid was diverted to faith-based groups instead. The cutoff occurred even though the shelter is housed at a VA hospital.

John F. Downing of United Veterans of America is certain faith-based groups were given preference in the grant process.

"These people were given technical assistance and access to the system that the rest of us didn't have," said Downing, whose agency was denied a $500,000 contract renewal.