been involved in community,self-help efforts. Nowhere in the current proposals is there a mention of strong policy commitments and cofumuni.ty capacity-building efforts (seed and technical assistance) to assist citizens, especially the former !'clients of the state" dropped overnight, to assume more responsibility in meeting their needs. There is little reason to expect that states and localities can spend money more wisely than the federal government, particularly on such a fast timetable. Without some national support encouraging community selfhelp, the net effect of the budget cuts will most likely result in an increas.ed dependency on government assistance, only this time it will be on state and local governments instead of the federal bureaucracy . Reagan-Style F·ederalism Much of former Governor Reagan's local control rhetoric boils down to a States' Rights platform. Acccordingly, the Administration proposes to consolidate more than 80 separate federal grant programs into several large block grants, e.g., education, health, human services, to the states-. The catch is that the block grant funding would equal only about 75 percent of the dollars currently going to the categorical grant programs they replace. The claim is that this merely reflects the savings added from "flexibility" and the allegedly greater efficiency of state and local governments when Uncle Sam isn't breathing down their backs with all those "unnecessary- regulations. " . The fact is that there is little reason to expect that States and localities can sp~nd money more wisely than the federal government, particularly on such a fast timetable (the Reagan forces are hard at work pushing for an October 1, 1981, start-up date). Moreover, given double-digit inflation, the real effects of the across-the-board cuts are more like 35 percent instead of 25 percent. Finally, when you throw in the administrative'overhead the states will need to run these programs, it's certain that there will be more cutbacks in 1 valuable programs. There are serveral implications here for community organizations. The block grant concept is not new. Nixon started it in 1972 with general revenue sharing. Later there was the Comprehensive Employment Tre:1ining Act (CETA) and Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) and a few others. The record of local govern- , ment's experience in managing these block grants has not been very good, especial!y upon comparison with legislated goals and regulations. The bottom line, as many citizen gn:mps know only too well, is that block grants basically become a highly sought after slice of • the very political local budget process pie. It is important to remember that the whole concept of categorical grants and programs grew out of the single-issue movement politics (environment, women, civil rights, welfare recipients) of the last 15 years. LBJ's Great Society, given the flows of its top-down centralist approach, was based,on the belief that there were urgent nationJuly 1981 RAIN Page 7 al problems that state and local officials could not and would not address. What is really significant is not so much how funds are distributed, (federal vs, state and local, categorical vs. block) but who benefits. Camouflaged as "cutting through bureaucratic red tape to allow greater community control," the Admini,stration is rushing to untie and deregulate many grant requirements that are essential from a community-based perspective, e.g., citizen participation, affirmative action, targeting of funds to low-income populationsall dealing with accountabililty, equity, and equal opportunity issues. A Community Agenda There appears to be two genei:al responses from community groups to the Reaganomics crisis and challenge. Unfortunately, the more likely scenario (at least for the short term) is that we'll fall for the bait and fight each other for our piece of the shrinking pie. However, the more intriguing possibility is that we'll go beyond the parochial attitudes that have characterized much of the "community sector," leaving us rather powerless to relate to either the public or private sectors. As Bruce Stokes points out: "In order to overcome these difficulties, self-help programs can best grow out of a political p~ocess of dialogue and confrontation at the local level in which citizens shape the progr~ms meant to help the,m.. . Projects must be controlled by the people they are meant to serve, and programs must be founded on local partnerships between the powerful and the powerless that are based on jointly defined goals." The most pressing gap that remains to be filled is to find ways to coalesce around the "common ground" we share and link the disparate community self-help efforts together by building partnerships between groups that have skills and experiences with those that have unmet needs. Through ·well-planned and articulated local selfreliance strategies, broad-based community coalitions can be , formed not only for political actions but for new resource-sharing ,What is really significant is not so much how funds are distributed, but who benefits. consortiums to eff,ectively deliver neighborhood-bas.ed.services. (On an upbeat note, it seems that many communities are in the · embryonic stages of developing comprehensive strategies for action. In Portland, Oregon, for instance, about 200 citizen activists recently gathered to discuss their shared needs and visions, and the possibilities of forming a long-range progressive agenda-an"Alliance for Social Change.'') With regard t·o government funding, Congressional Legislators must be persuaded not to untie block grants from critical stipulations concerning citizen accountability and equal opportunity. At the state and local levels, strong community organizing and especially citizen monitoring efforts can ensure that some community concerns will be met and that some equitable distribution of funds are restored. ' Still, survival for many groups in the near future will be very tough. Grass-roots fund raising efforts will certainly be needed. For the longer term, making the political connection to self-help efforts . cont.--
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