As Jilma Meneses settles into her role at the helm of Catholic Charities of Western Washington, she says her top priority is to establish the organisation’s sustainability plan for the future given the uncertainty around potentially looming federal cuts.
Like Catholic Charities branches nationwide, Catholic Charities of Western Washington – encompassing the areas covered by the Archdiocese of Seattle – operates a number of its services through federal and state contracts. For Meneses, the question now is if and how the organisation can provide those services if those contracts disappear.
To find out, and prepare, the organisation is creating budget scenarios related to the potential impacts to the organisation’s programs, and people, for budget cuts up to 50 per cent.
“Nobody wants to cut 50 per cent, and I hope that doesn’t happen, but if we do, at least we will know what the impacts are ahead of time and we’ll be prepared. Same for if there are 25 per cent cuts, 10 per cent, cuts – whatever it is,” Meneses told Crux on March 25.
Since the Trump administration took office in January, and subsequently took a hatchet to aspects of federal spending deemed unnecessary, Catholic Charities organisations nationwide have been forced to lay off employees and shutdown programs. Specifically, organisations have been forced to make cuts to their refugee resettlement and immigrant services.
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