Perceptions of Nonprofit Special
Interest Groups
and the Effects on the Political Dialogue
Moderator:
Harriet Trudell
Feminist Majority
John McLaughlin
Fabrizio-McLaughlin
Frank Luntz, Ph.D.
Luntz Research
Charles Orasin
Craver, Mathews, Smith and Company
HARRIET TRUDELL
FEMINIST MAJORITY
I'm Harriet Trudell with the Feminist
Majority and I'm here this morning to introduce the panel
for you on the "Perceptions of Non- Profit Special Interest
Groups: The Effects on the Political Dialogue."
We have three panelists with us this
morning. The first one who will lead off is John McLaughlin.
He's a partner with the national political opinion polling
and strategic consulting firm of Fabrizio-McLaughlin and
Associates. He previously served as a political analyst and
vice president of Arthur J. Finkelstein and Associates and
Diversified Research, Incorporated.
He is a veteran of Republican campaigns,
including North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms' 1990 Senate
race, Frank Rizzo's 1991 upset in the Republican primary for
Philadelphia Mayor, Senator Faircloth's 1992 upset victory
over incumbent Terry Sanford in North Carolina and George
Allen's 1993 successful campaign for Governor of
Virginia.
A graduate of Fordham College with a
Bachelor's Degree in political science, McLaughlin has a
Master's in business administration from Fordham
University.
Want to start?
JOHN MCLAUGHLIN
PARTNER, FABRIZIO-MCLAUGHLIN AND ASSOCIATES
MR. McLAUGHLIN: If anyone was expecting
the other John McLaughlin --
(Laughter)
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: -- he was a Jesuit priest
but I just went to a Jesuit school. So, I'm not his son so
we'll dispel that rumor.
But, my partner, Tony Fabrizio, he is the
real Tony Fabrizio, but he couldn't be here today so I had
to pinch hit. So, we're taking a break from political,
non-profit and corporate polling and public opinion
research. A lot of what we do is for political and non-
profits. We help them raise money.
I'm not going to release any proprietary
data, but we often find that, just like you get votes, you
all here know that you have to go and you have to get people
to contribute and invest in your ideas and invest in your
causes. We do a great deal of business in that
regard.
I want to talk a bit about the
environment.
First, let me ask a question. How many
people here can tell me who the first justice of the Supreme
Court was, the United States Supreme Court.
One, two -- yes, sir.
PARTICIPANT: (Inaudible).
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Two people in a
conference on free speech -- three people, okay.
PARTICIPANT: There are a lot of chickens.
What is the answer.
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: It's John Jay.
How many people could name the judge
presiding over the O.J. Simpson Case?
(Laughter)
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Is this a great country
or what? My point is made. In this society, you're dealing
with people who know what they want to know and whatever
they don't want to know, they don't care about. The
information they deal with needs to be free. Just wait until
they find out that Jimmy Carter promised the Haitian
government the Panama Canal.
(Laughter)
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: But the reality is,
you're dealing with a society where we have moved from a
government which won its freedom by force and in a way a
society that has moved public opinion to some degree. Before
the American democracy, et cetera, we were a civilization
that made its progress by force. Then, we learned to
substitute money for force.
Today, you are substituting information
for force. In fact, that's the power that's driving your
members and people to invest in your ideas and your
personality.
You define yourself by information. It's
ideas and the people that are associated with you. You have
an (inaudible), post- industrial, technology-fragmented
society and who controls the information. There are great
opportunities to you, because you can control that
information about your organization.
I'm not going to tell -- there's very
different groups here. I've never worked for the Feminist
Majority. It would have made my wife happy, but you know. I
tend to work for --
MS. TRUDELL: It might have made you
happy, too. (Laughter)
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: What is amazing is, we're
on a panel today to talk about free speech and ideas. We are
on the same side. We all support the Bill of Rights and we
all have the ability to control information about our groups
and about our causes.
The great part is, with the changes and
what's going on, the government is trying to stop that. You
have a political environment where through new election
laws, through new lobbying laws, through laws on the media,
through financial laws, through new laws on computers, they
are trying to, in effect, take control of that, to control
the information.
The political environment is such that
the majority of Americans and more so -- I'm not sure about
the feminist majority, but most Americans -- I think it is
probably true. They say that today, they favor smaller
government, a smaller government over a larger
government.
They absolutely do. They've tracked this
through. It was about dead even in 1988 and our polls this
year, we have Americans this year telling us 58.8 percent.
In the last poll, we asked this year, if you have a smaller
government, fewer services, versus 32 percent, larger
government with larger services, with more services.
What they want to do is -- you're seeing
a linking of an effect. People who want to cut back the size
of the government and have more freedom and it's blurring a
bit at the ideological lines. The second part of this is,
everybody is defining personalities that they see with
public policy issues like Clinton. He's brought a whole new
standard to this. I mean, he's probably perceived as the
most liberal president in history. At the beginning of the
year, he started with a 47 percent liberal rating and a nine
percent conservative rating.
But the worst part of it is the plurality
of Americans that is now the majority, say they don't think
he's a person of good honesty and integrity. They disagree
with that statement. They also believe -- 58 percent say he
favors larger government and only 29 percent smaller
government. These are our polls and we have published these
over the course of the years.
That's the environment you're playing in.
What is interesting about here -- I was watching during this
morning on the previous panels. People are monitoring what's
happening with the lobbying law, in effect, to clean up the
government and say okay, how are they restricting our rights
of free speech. It is unifying people who are on the
conservative side of the spectrum with people who are on the
liberal side of the spectrum.
For your organizations, how you raise
money in this kind of an environment is definitely going to
be defined by, in effect, the electronic media you go
through. It's going to be less and less, fewer and fewer
people tend to use print media. If I were to ask somebody in
the audience, when was the last time they wrote a friend,
not for business reasons, but when was the last time you
wrote a friend. It wouldn't be as often as people used to do
it. Generationally, we've gotten away from that. Now, we
pick up the phone.
With contributor groups, they're doing it
more and more electronically, by cable TV, by telephone. In
effect, the paper part of our society is becoming less
important as the electronic becomes more important.
Also, there is a blurring of the fine
line between for profit and non-profit. Probably the most
well-known conservative fund raiser in the country is Rush
Limbaugh and he's doing it for profit. He's on the radio. He
sells products. He has his Limbaugh newsletter.
So, there is a blurring of this special
interest between for profit and not for profit. People who
give and invest in ideas and people don't make the
distinction of, well, are they a for profit or a non- profit
group unless they are educated for that. That touches on the
last part about the personalities.
We'll close with the fragmentation of the
media. It's more important to define your ideas and have
people, in effect, who can symbolize your ideas and be able
to get your point across very quickly, clearly and
consistently in the public arena.
Back to Harriet. Have you sent me a
contributor form yet?
MS. TRUDELL: Well, of course. Your
newsletter will be in the mail in the morning.
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Thank you very
much.
MS. TRUDELL: You are welcome.
Thank you very much.
Our next speaker will be Dr. Frank Luntz.
He is the President of Luntz Research Company, Incorporate,
a polling firm. Luntz most recently handled the polling for
New York Mayor Ralph Guilliani and conducted focus groups
for the "Wall Street Journal, Newsweek," ABC News and
PBS.
Mr. Luntz is an adjunct assistant
professor at the University of Pennsylvania. He previously
taught at George Washington University.
He is the author of "Candidates,
Consultants and Campaigns", a book on American
electioneering. He is a graduate of the University of
Pennsylvania with a Bachelor's Degree in history and
political science. He received his Ph.D. in politics in 1987
from Oxford University and in 1993 was named a Fellow at
Harvard University's Institute of Politics. Mr.
Luntz.
FRANK LUNTZ
PRESIDENT, LUNTZ RESEARCH COMPANY
MR. LUNTZ: Thank you.
I have known John for, I don't know --
seven, eight years, and I can tell you that if there is
money in the feminist majority, John will do the polling for
them.
(Laughter)
John would wear a skirt if that's what it
took.
(Laughter)
I'm going to approach this from a
slightly different angle and give the you the results that
our firm did -- it was a Study of the Hudson Institute on
the American Dream. So, the few numbers I'm going to give
you go back over time and this is going to be released on
October 24th. So, I'm not going to get too far into
it.
But the first question we can find that
was asked how do you define the American Dream goes back to
1953 and 71 percent of Americans defined it in some sort of
spiritual terms. I don't mean that in terms of religion. I
mean that in terms of free speech, free press, religious
freedom, some sort of non-tangible definition and only 20
percent defined it in terms of money car, house, vacations,
enough money to retire on.
In 1973, that 71 percent spiritual had
dropped to 51 percent and, the materialistic had risen to 39
percent. As we will release on October 24th, right now only
one in three Americans define it in some sort of spiritual
terms. Almost two-thirds define it in materialistic
terms.
The whole concept of what this country
needs is being lost on a younger generation. In a
presentation yesterday with several reporters, we started
getting into the concept of free speech and how it relates
to Congress and how it relates to the overall governing
institutions.
Right now on whatever date this is, we
all have been travelling so much, I've got no clue. I just
know it's October and it's Thursday, I think.
Faith and trust in public institutions is
at an all time low. I think the most recent figure -- and we
don't even have it any more because, CNN and "USA Today"
came out with something more recent. It was about 17 percent
of Americans have faith and confidence in their governing
institutions to represent them. You now have a four to one
margin belief that people like you all -- and I'm going to
lump you in with lobbyists. I'm going to lump you in with
special interest groups because some of you are.
By a four to one margin people believe
that it's you all that control Washington rather than they
themselves.
That's why there this is this deep anger.
This explains why Ross Perot still has support even
today.
There is a feeling that it is the gun
lobbyists, that it is the health care lobbyists, that it is
the business lobbyists, that it is the feminist lobbyists,
that it is all these groups that have control. It is the
political action committees that are running the show and
that you all, the people out there, don't get heard
from.
The two debates that I found most
interesting, that may relate to some of the people in this
room was the crime bill debate and the health care
debate.
In the health care debate you found the
Chamber of Commerce to many people who would consider
themselves conservative, completely abrogated their
responsibilities and their representation of businesses
across the country. They got hurt really badly and I think
that's going to continue over the next year or two.
There are people in the business
community that don't believe that the leadership of the
chamber properly represented them and, that it was groups
like the National Federation of Independent Business, NFIB
and the Small Business Survival Committee that stepped to
the plate and argued with Clinton against other
organizations.
But what the public sees out there, they
don't differentiate the difference between for profit and
not for profit. The public sees the whole mass out
there.
I found it very interesting. Andy Carter,
who was in the Bush Administration stepped up to the plate
for the Automobile Association, at least GM, Ford and
Chrysler. He was calling for universal health care, when I
have to believe that in the Bush Administration, he was an
advocate against such a proposal.
The public sees people like this being
paid salesmen is the nicest way to put it for their causes.
The four least respected occupations in America today are,
used car salesmen, lobbyists, TV talk show hosts and
Congressmen.
MR. MCLAUGHLIN: You didn't ask
pollsters.
MR. LUNTZ: Most people would think a
pollster is someone who does couches and chairs.
(Laughter)
My mother, when she has to explain what I
do, gives that kind of a definition. She doesn't want to
admit that I call strange people up on the phone after what
happened to the President of American University.
(Laughter)
I do hope that he never hears this,
because he's not in the room. So, for you all and what you
do you are not in good shape right now and with the GATT
Bill being put off, again Americans look toward Washington
and they ask the age-old question: Why? Why does this system
work this way? Why can't we make government work more
effectively? Why does it seem like every time we have a
priority, whether it be on the left or on the right,
politicians never seem to listen? Why do they spend so much
money very often for programs that you want them to spend it
on? Why do they tax us so much? Why don't we get our money's
worth? When we get to questions, I'll give you some answers
to those.
MS. TRUDELL: Thank you very much, Mr.
Luntz.
Now, our third panelist, Mr. Charles
Orasin. After 17 years of working to prevent gun violence,
Charlie brought his movement, Building Strategic Planning,
Creative and Fundraising Skills, to Craver Mathews, Smith
and Company in 1992. He served as a senior vice
president.
He is a graduate of Georgetown
University. Charlie initially worked for Congressman Howard
Robinson on Capitol Hill and in the political campaign of
Senator Jacob Javitz.
In 1975, he joined a new organization
formed to take on the National Rifle Association and pass
effective gun laws. Charlie subsequently became President of
Hand Gun Control, Incorporated and established an
educational initiative, the Center to Prevent Hand Gun
Violence and a political force, the Hand Gun Control Voter
Education Fund. Under his guidance, numerous national and
state gun laws were enacted. The recent enactment of the
Brady Law and the Assault Weapons Bill is a culmination of
this work.
In 1992, Charlie decided to look for a
way where he could apply his wide range of experience to a
variety of non-profits. Craver, Mathews and Smith has always
stood as a leader for social change. It's personally
gratifying to me to be able to make a difference by helping
a variety of causes to make this society a better place. Mr.
Orasin.
CHARLES ORASIN
CRAVER, MATHEWS, SMITH AND COMPANY
MR. ORASIN: Thank you very much.
I'd like to pick up on what my
distinguished liberals to the right of me have been talking
about and focus really on the progressive community that our
firm specializes in.
The 1992 election was very much of a
watershed event for many of our clients. As we do with many
of them, we urged them to take a pulse of their donors, to
see exactly how they view the political situation as well as
how they view that organization every two years. It was
particularly important after the 1992 election. Over the
last year and a half, we have done at least 7 or 8 different
polls for different non-profits.
We have seen a common thread through many
of the survey findings that I'd like to talk a little bit
about.
First, there is some good news out there
and I would just like to go back to our independent sector
plan. I don't know if you have done an updated one. But
although the government has less and less of a high regard
out there with the American people, more and more people are
counting on or non-profits to fill that void.
In fact, 88 percent of the public believe
that non-profits are more needed now than they did five
years ago. A whopping 73 percent believe that non-profits
make our communities a better place to live.
This same poll done by the independent
sector -- it was a GALLUP poll -- did find some negative
strands, though.
Forty-three percent, nearly half of the
public did not believe that non-profits are more effective
now than they were five years ago. Only 57 percent believe
that non-profits are not wasteful in their use of funds.
That was 1992 and we have had, as you know, different
troubles with different major charities including the United
Way.
I think what Frank and what John are
saying is, distrust of government, when you turn on TV and
you see news stories about the pay and perks of our elected
representatives who we are paying with taxpayers' funds and
then you see the so-called scandals in major charities where
again there is the question of paying perks, it begins to
sully the image of non-profits. It does have a domino effect
on other non-profit organizations.
We urge our clients not only to take a
pulse on their issue with the clients or their donors, but
to make sure they see how the donors view them in the
non-profit sector.
We've seen over the last couple of years
that donors have been squeezed on many areas because of the
economy. So, they are not giving as much as they did before.
The Clinton election caused many donors on our side of the
equation to take a pause. The good guys have now won. We
don't have to be as generous as we were before. So, they cut
back on their giving.
At the same time, with the United Way and
other charity problems, there is a higher scrutiny in terms
of how these organizations were spending their money.
There is also what I call the fuzzy
factor. If you look at how many thousands of non-profits are
out there, to many donors there seems to be -- it could be
15 to a dozen organizations working on the same issue. When
they open up their mailbox they see a dozen solicitations
for groups that all seem to be doing the same thing. They
don't quite understand why there are so many, how are they
spending those funds and why should I join.
So, we've seen not only a decline in
giving to many organizations from long-time members, but a
reluctance of individuals to join new organizations. That
obviously has an impact on the organization's future.
We've also seen, I think, with everything
going on in Washington, people looking to communities
locally and at the state level to take care of problems. I
think that also then is carried over to non-profits. Rather
than send their check 3,000 miles away, they'd like to see
the check sent locally to some organization where they can
see the tangible impact of that contribution.
One of our clients, (inaudible), I think
is a great example where somebody can see concretely, i.e.,
building a house where their money is going. But with the
local building of homes people see where their dollar is
going. To a lot of these organizations, they send a check.
They don't have a clue as to how the money is being
spent.
Many of our clients really had a cold
shower. Not only did the Clinton administration's election
have a major effect on the environment in which they were
raising funds, they also found that many of the problems
that major charities were finding with their donors were
also carried over to their own members.
Many of these organizations had been in
existence for decades, yet over the years they have somewhat
lost their road map. They weren't quite certain where they
were going, what their mission really is, if they have
accomplished various goals, where were they now going. So,
the donors were confused.
What we have urged non-profits to doing
-- and I'm glad to see all the good work for the Free Speech
Coalition on the regulatory side. There are things
non-profits can do today on their own in a more proactive
way to deal with concerns of donors out there. The first is
to define or redefine the problem that they're fighting, the
Devil that they're fighting, the mission of the
organization. So, it's very clear to the donors who exactly
they are writing a check to and why.
Secondly, it is very important, what I
call nitching your organization. What is that unique nitch
that you feel that no other organization does. We do a lot
of work for environmental clients and there are some 15 out
there fighting in the mail for money. Well, what is unique
about this environmental group versus that environmental
group.
Third, if buy products through the mail,
through L.L. BEAN or if you are just aware of how the banks
treat you and things like that, there is a higher value now
to customer loyalty. People expect to be able to pick up
their phone and call an 800 number if they have a problem.
They expect quick answers, responses if they have a
defective product.
Non-profits have to start treating their
donors as more customers and investors. The same treatment
that you get on the commercial side has to be translated to
how you treat people on the non-profit side. If you went
back to look at your membership services department, how
many weeks behind are they in answering complaints from your
members.
One of our clients had a three-month
backlog of handling membership complaints. Yet, they were
concerned about how much they were paying to bring in every
new donor. Yet, over here, they were losing literally
hundreds of people because of failure and neglect, failing
to take care of them. It is very important that you treat
these donors as customers. You answer those letters promptly
and thank them. I think many non-profits think that these
donors owe them the money, rather than these donors
investing in you. When is the last time you picked up the
phone and just said thank you and didn't ask for another
gift. That's very important.
Something that John had said in the
previous panel which is very important. Show the donors the
success stories, what you're doing, an annual report, a
newsletter, something to show them how that money is being
spent. I'm surprised that some of your organizations don't
send out basic information on extraordinary wins they have
accomplished. With donors figuring out whether or not they
should continue giving money, if they are not getting any
reinforcement in the mail, why bother?
Another important factor we found in our
surveys is the tangibility. Try to show what you are doing
in concrete terms. Bring it back to the person's real life.
If you ever read some of the environmental mail that goes
out, it is so complicated, you don't know what they are
fighting on, when the fact is, they are talking about the
dirty water that is coming out of your faucet or when you
walk down the beach, your child doesn't step on a
needle.
With too many organizations, there is a
disconnect between their life, in terms of how they view
their issues and what their donors and the public see. You
have to simplify your message and make it simple.
It is very important to provide
stewardship reports. I was stunned to hear how many major
charities don't quickly provide a financial report. The
moment you don't quickly provide something, you just start
raising questions in the donors' mind. Why did I get this
financial report from this charity, but I'm not getting a
financial report from this charity?
They should be easy to understand. Don't
just send out your normal audited statement, which takes a
financial education to understand and read. Something very
simple, as simple as a pie chart to show how you're spending
the money. You would be surprised how much that will
mitigate concerns and questions by these donors. I think
that will have a domino effect on this regulatory side. If
non-profits were much more proactive in providing this
information, I don't think you'd have the problems that
we're seeing right now.
One major thing again which continues to
surprise me is that, if you are a non-profit and you face a
major crisis, deal with it promptly, forcefully and put
everything on the table right away to the media. It amazes
me that, what could have been a one-day story becomes a
month long story because of an organization's unwillingness
to deal with the media or to answer forcefully and truthful
what is going on.
When a head of an organization says, come
on in, I'll tell you everything and then the press calls,
okay, we're here to answer your questions and they won't
answer the questions, of course, now you're going to attract
the media locally. You have that effect of having to go
outside that region.
Again, the organization's credibility
which you have often spent decades to earn out there can be
lost without quick crisis response to a situation. I think
that is something every organization should have on the
shelf, particularly in this day and age. Finally, I know you
have spent a lot of time going over the different
regulations that are coming down the pike and things that
non-profits have to deal with. I look upon new regulations
as opportunities to your own benefit, some of these.
For example, the new IRS regulations on
receipts for $250 gifts and $75 gifts, rather than having to
look upon it as more financial information you're going to
have to give out, look upon it as a cultivation opportunity
for donors. If you sent out an envelope in 1995 that says
1994 tax receipt enclosed, you're going to have 100 percent
of the people open it, because they are going to want to use
that for their tax return.
You can use the letter not only to thank
them for their gift, but provide that success story as we're
encouraging clients to put in a bounce-back device. You are
going to get contributions back from that donor who sees you
are being very responsive to their concerns.
Then, the last thing. If you pick up the
back of any response device, you will see this other legal
gobbledy-gook that shows all the states and regulatory
agency that the non-profit has filed their reports in. Turn
that into more of a sell document for yourself. Before you
get into all the legal gobbledy-gook, just put in a few
lines that, we are pleased to provide you upon request an
annual report or audited statement. At the same time, we are
pleased to provide these other agencies, regulatory groups
with this information. So, you can get that upon request. If
you have to do it by law anyhow, take advantage of
it.
The bottom line is, I think donors are
increasingly skeptical. I think that their loyalties with
many established organizations are now being questioned. I
think there is opportunity here to repair the damage and to
continue raising more funds out there for not only those
donors, but from other donors.
Thank you.
MS. TRUDELL: Thank you.
Before I ask for questions from the
audience, are there any comments from the panel? Would you
all like to make some further comments? If not, I'll be very
glad to take questions for the panelists.
(No response)
MS. TRUDELL: Nobody has any questions?
Were we that good?
(Laughter)
MR. ORASIN: It's right before
lunch.
MS. TRUDELL: Right, everybody is
hungry.
Thank you all three very much. We
appreciate it.
(Applause)
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