Today’s Nashville City Paper reports on a volunteer program that will be implemented with the help of the Salute 2009 Team Building Award winner:

A new program aimed to give Metro workers time to volunteer in schools will kick-off Wednesday morning when Mayor Karl Dean rolls up his sleeves to help East Nashville students in art class.

One primary goal of the initiative is to generate hands-on community support for the schools by making it easier for city employees to volunteer in Metro Nashville Public Schools during the workweek.

The mayor will release more details on the new program when he signs an executive order Wednesday at Warner Elementary to create the program.

Representatives of the PENCIL Foundation will help Metro manage the program.

Click here to read further coverage of this initiative.

The former executive director of the nonprofit set up by Metro to run channels 9 and 10 is facing questions today amid reports of $70,000 of questionable transactions, reports the Tennessean:

Auditors found a series of “significant misappropriated funds” that appear to be linked to Catalano. They include home cable bills, a personal vacation, restaurant meals, questionable equipment purchases, payments to his son’s company and even home rent – all paid for out of the corporation accounts. The report said a vehicle given to the corporation is missing without a trace.

Many other transactions over the period reviewed since 2003 had no receipts or documentation to explain them, the report said.

“Obviously, it raised serious issues to take it to a higher level,” said Rich Riebeling, Metro’s finance director. “This seems to be very suspect activity that needs to be looked into.”

The Nashville City paper has a story today on the court proceedings involving Teen Challenge, a faith based nonprofit that filed a lawsuit when Metro changed the zoning code, forcing them to sell their property at auction.  

Metro is facing a potential $1.35 million bill for its admitted violation of the federal Fair Housing Act, it was revealed in court Tuesday.

During the damages-only trial in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, plaintiff Teen Challenge outlined expenses it incurred as the result of a controversial change to the Metro zoning code, which forced the faith-based nonprofit to sell its Goodlettsville property at auction last year.

“The Metropolitan government has already admitted liability,” said Metro attorney Frank Young.

The admission of liability came after Metro Council edited the zoning code last year to exclude rehabilitation services as a permitted use in agricultural districts. The zoning change was pushed by District 10 Councilman Rip Ryman after Teen Challenge had purchased the property in his Goodlettsville district.

Teen Challenge is a nondenominational Christian organization, which offers drug and alcohol rehab services to young adults. When Teen Challenge revealed what its intentions were for the property, the neighbors protested adamantly.

Ryman responded by changing the zoning code, which forced Teen Challenge to sell its property.

*Click here for an update on this case from today’s Nashville City Paper.

*Update: The Tennessean has a story on the issue today.

The Center for Nonprofit Management will work with Metro to implement a task force that will examine Metro’s Community Enhancement Fund grant process. The story was published today on Nashville City Paper’s Web site. Issues related to the domestic violence sub-category were raised initially by Councilman Charlie Tygard:

Domestic violence nonprofits were allocated a total of $750,000, with six groups receiving funds.

It was also revealed that a board member for one of the groups receiving grant funds was on the panel that conducted the review process. Although she didn’t vote, YWCA board member Susan Huggins served on the CEF panel.

The YWCA had the lowest score of the 11 programs applying for funds in the domestic violence category, but still received $196,000 in Metro funds. Although the YWCA had the lowest overall score, it ranked higher because it provides shelter and advocacy programs, which were given greater priority during the ranking process.

Even those who have questioned the process insist there was no impropriety on the part of the panel and that Dean’s idea behind the new system was sound.

“I don’t concede everything was done the best,” Riebeling said. “We’re going to ask the Center for Nonprofit Management to put together a task force to look at issues, how they come up with their scores, how we can make it better for next year.”

In its inaugural year, the Metro grant process may face amendments from within the council, specifically from Councilman Charlie Tygard.  Here is a portion of the article published in the Nashville City Paper:

Yesterday, Tygard said he’s going to file an amendment to alter the funding awards before the Council votes on the issue next week.

He illustrated the Domestic Violence recommendation as an example of why the amendment is needed. Once the organizations had been scored, the Domestic Violence section refined its process to focus on some key areas such as shelter services. However, Tygard said this section had a panelist who was also a board member of the YWCA of Nashville and Middle Tennessee that received $196,170.

“There was an individual, who I’m sure is an honest and caring [individual], and did what she thought was right, but by being on the board in one of the agencies in that category that received a large amount of money and the fact that the discussion was steered towards changing the way the grants were given as opposed to the other two categories, obviously raises some questions,” Tygard said.

 Did you apply for a Metro grant? What did you think of the process?

Many Nashville area nonprofits took part in the new metro grant process. The Community Enhancement Fund committees met Monday and Tuesday. No word yet on when the grants will be announced, but the recommendations will be on the Mayor’s desk by the end of the week.  Here is the full story from the Nashville City Paper.

Nonprofit recommendations will be given to mayor this week
By: By Nate Rau, nrau@nashvillecitypaper.com

Posted: Wednesday, July 16, 2008 12:02 am

The final meetings for Metro’s new nonprofit grants program were completed Tuesday. That means the Community Enhancement Fund committees should have their recommendations this week about which Nashville programs should receive city funding.

A panel of reviewers, appointed by Mayor Karl Dean, Vice Mayor Diane Neighbors and Metro Councilman Erik Cole, chairman of the budget and finance committee, ranked 124 area nonprofits seeking Metro grants.

The committees will be allocating a total of $2 million to the three nonprofit areas of emphasis identified by Dean as warranting Metro funds – domestic violence, education and aftercare programs and community service.

Brenda Wynn, the chair of the community service committee, said her group will recommend six non-profit programs to receive a grand total of $500,000. The domestic violence and education committees will each be allocating $750,000 for nonprofits in their areas of emphasis.

Dean said the new CEF program was implemented to take the politicking out of the process and to ensure accountability for those programs receiving funding.

“I think the process went extremely well,” Wynn said.

The recommendations will be to Dean’s office by the end of the week, Wynn said.

 Update: The Nashville City Paper just posted this story.