March 31, 2003
Friendly hearing on HUD regulations
turns to debate on faith-based funding
___By Robert Marus
___ABP Washington Bureau
___WASHINGTON (ABP)--A House committee hearing intended as a showcase for the benefits of government funding for religious housing programs instead became a forum for lively debate on the issues surrounding President Bush's faith-based initiatives.
___A subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee held a March 25 hearing on proposed regulatory changes that would allow more government support of religious housing ministries.
___The most controversial part of the HUD rule change, announced in January, would allow churches and other
| Church-state entanglement, hiring discrimination policies questioned. |
religious groups operating housing ministries to construct buildings that could include sanctuaries or chapels, so long as the rooms also were used for "secular purposes" at times, or other parts of the building were used for the secular purpose of the housing ministry. The regulations said government funding would be reduced in proportion to the percentage of the building that was used for religious purposes.
___"This approach creates the potential for excessive entanglement between church and state," said Brent Walker, director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, in testimony before the subcommittee. "It raises the specter of horrendous accounting problems, logistical difficulties and burdensome auditing and record keeping. Moreover, it would almost certainly create the need for perpetual (government) monitoring."
___The regulations--like many recent changes to executive-branch agency rules regarding government grants to religious organizations--have been altered by administrative order as part of President Bush's faith-based initiatives. Bush has asserted such organizations should have the right to receive government funding to provide social services without changing their fundamental religious character. Critics have said Bush's plan is unconstitutional. Court rulings have not provided a settled answer.
___Douglas Kmiec, dean of the Catholic University School of Law, claimed such regulations as the one Walker decried were the grant recipients' problem to worry about, not the government's. Kmiec acknowledged tension exists between limiting the use of federal funds for religious purposes and imposing a change on the religious character of a grant recipient.
___Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Bob Ney, R-Ohio, a supporter of Bush's faith-based initiatives, scheduled the hearing at the request of subcommittee member Barney Frank, D-Mass., a strong opponent of faith-based initiatives. Besides Ney, only one other member of the Republican majority showed up for the hearing. But several Democratic members came and questioned aspects of the faith-based plan in general.
___Many of the Democrats on the subcommittee particularly questioned the faith-based plan's exemptions for religious discrimination. The White House has assured religious organizations receiving government funding that they would be allowed to retain an exemption under federal civil-rights laws that allow churches and other heavily religious groups to discriminate in hiring on the basis of religion or ideology.
___The subcommittee's African-American members particularly seemed to take exception to allowing government to fund groups that could discriminate. "My concern is trying to figure out exactly why these proposed changes are being offered," said Rep. David Scott, D-Ga. "Of what value is it, and why would we want to remove the requirement that employment discrimination not be funded by government?"
___Kmiec noted that forbidding religious organizations to hire on the basis of religion in order to receive government funding would force them to change the very nature of their organizations, thus in itself discriminating against religious groups.
___But Rep. Artur Davis, D-Ala., noted the regulations also would forbid religious organizations receiving funds from discriminating on the basis of religion when serving clients with government funds. "If it doesn't change the nature of an organization for me to serve people of another faith, then how does it change the nature of an organization to hire people of another faith?" Davis asked.
___Kmiec responded that individuals hired to deliver secular service at small religious social-service agencies often have broad job descriptions that also may involve them delivering religious services in a non-government-funded part of their work.
___But subcommittee ranking minority member Maxine Waters, D-Calif., said she wasn't satisfied with that approach. Quoting a congressional proverb, she said, "If you dip your hand in the public till, don't be surprised if a little democracy rubs off."
___HUD representatives were not present for the hearing, leading the subcommittee's Democrats to request another hearing where they could question an administrator from that agency.
___
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