San Francisco Chronicle: Bay Area nonprofits brace for 2010 Armageddon

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Bay Area nonprofits brace for 2010 Armageddon
Meredith May, Chronicle Staff Writer

Sunday, March 1, 2009


Nonprofits are seeing an alarming drop in funding and increased demand for help this year, setting the stage for a complete shakeup of the sector in 2010.

Unlike recessions past, this one could permanently alter the nonprofit landscape, say nonprofit CEOs, forcing possible closures and mergers as the sector restructures to survive.

Hardest hit will be the Bay Area, home to one of the highest concentrations of nonprofits in the nation. There are 25,000 nonprofits in the region; 7,000 in San Francisco alone. Among them are 10,000 charitable nonprofits with budgets above $25,000. Their combined budgets account for 14 percent of the Bay Area's gross national product - twice the national average.

Many are teetering.

"A lot of nonprofits are living on this year's operating budget, which is based on what they raised a year ago before the economic crisis really hit," said Denise Gammal, co-author of a Stanford University report on Bay Area charities and vice president of strategy and organizational Learning for United Way of the Bay Area. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/01/MN0K165OA5.DTL&tsp=1