ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates that secular nonprofits are able to offer major welfare-to-work services due to their receiving government funding, but at the cost of losing their independence. It shows that faith-based programs, with only modest amounts of government funding, have maintained their independence, but at the cost of being able to serve very limited numbers of the needy. By limiting the percentage of the independent sector providers’ budgets that comes from government sources, by making it easier for providers to develop private and independent funding sources, and by establishing legal rules of the game for the government-faith-based provider partnership. The chapter examines the independent sector would regain much of its independence, receive an infusion of new strength from revitalized faith-based providers, and recipients of faith-based services would find new protections. Most important of all, new resources would be unleashed for meeting social needs that all too often appear intractable.
