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Scientists Stunned as Medical Non-Profit Group Abruptly Ends Research Grants (nature.com)
A major US non-profit group focused on improving child health has abruptly terminated US$3 million in research grants -- leaving nearly 40 scientists confused, angry and scrambling to secure new funding. From a report: On 24 July, 37 grant recipients received an e-mail from the March of Dimes Foundation in New York City informing them that their 3-year grants had been cut off, retroactively, starting on 30 June. Many of the researchers were only a year into their projects, and had had just enough time to hire and train staff, purchase supplies and generate preliminary results. Now, several say that they might need to lay off employees, euthanize lab animals and shelve their research projects if they cannot find other funding -- fast. The March of Dimes, which is supported largely by individual donations, made the decision to revoke the grants because of a budget shortfall, says Kelle Moley, the group's chief scientific officer. "I know this is harsh news," Moley says. "As a former grantee, this would be devastating to me as well." That is small consolation to many researchers whom Nature spoke to.
The abruptness suggests that March of Dimes staff is incompetent and couldn't see the shortfall coming, that some major funding source suddenly cut them off, or maybe some insider embezzled a bunch of money. In any case, this doesn't look like a typical, "Gee, we've been having some difficulties raising money" scenario.
Charity Navigator rates the March of Dimes at 2 out of 5 stars, and 1 out of 5 on the financial scale.
Their program expenses, administrative expenses, fundraising expenses, and fundraising efficiency are all pretty good. But they basically ran out of money. Liability to assets should be 10% but it is 113%!!! I can't tell what they did wrong, other than paying their CEO a half a million dollars a year. That wouldn't be unreasonable if that CEO brought in millions of more dollars than a CEO who made $100k/year, but clearly something was mismanaged if it got to this point.