If approved by the General Assembly, proposed state budget cuts designed to alleviate a bulging deficit could also negatively impact the efforts of the Virginia Foundation for Humanities' African American Heritage Program? to preserve African-American history in Virginia.
The Heritage program, founded in 1999 and based in Charlottesville, oversees about 20 other informative and grant-giving programs, according to Sheryl Hayes, director of development at the Virginia Foundation for Humanities. The purpose of these subsidiary programs, the biggest of which is an online database of Virginia historical sites of African-American cultural significance, is "to preserve, protect and promote the history of Virginia's African-Americans," she said.
Continuing such preservation, however, may become more difficult if Gov. Tim Kaine's proposed state budget cuts are approved later this year. The proposed cuts are the result of a $641 revenue shortfall in the current budget period that will end June 30.
Kaine spokesperson Jeff Tiller said "non-state agencies received no funding in the first year of the governor's proposed budget," adding that funding levels for many organizations and programs were cut as a necessary means of controlling the already large Virginia deficit.
Hayes said the program currently is funded by the commonwealth's budget as well as by donations from corporations and foundations. Donations from private institutions, however, are typically only used for specific projects and grants, Hayes said, noting that state money pays overhead and salaries associated with the program, costs needed to keep the program fully operational.
"This appropriation is extremely important to the life of the program," Hayes said.
She noted that without commonwealth funding, the Virginia Foundation for Humanities would have to curb -- if not completely cut -- many of the projects within the African American Heritage Program.
"We are strongly committed to that program and we will do everything in our power to keep it; however, that is going to be very difficult without this [appropriations] money," Hayes said.
According to Deborah McDowell, interim director at the Carter G. Woodson Institute for Afro-American and African Studies, such budget cuts can be frustrating.
"Obviously, any time you have a budget cut to a program with which you have an intellectual investment, of course, there is a disappointment," she said.
McDowell added that when programs such as the Heritage project are mostly dependent on outside funding -- and are thus financially unstable -- "the broader objectives of the programs are jeopardized."
Currently in session, the General Assembly will review and vote on Kaine's budget proposal in the coming weeks.
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