Nonprofit

THE ROLAND PARK Second Presbyterian Church looked absolutely stunning last Saturday for the wedding of Natalia Pia Melanie Sommer and Richard Matthew Dohler. Thousands of wildflowers, miles of lace ribbons and tulle, and window sills decorated with Singapore orchids set the stage for the nuptials of the daughter of pop music star Donna Summer and her first husband, Helmut Sommer,and the son of Dick and Bonna Dohler, he's an Ellicott City builder.The church was filled with the music of German trumpeteer Langston Fitzgerald and selections of Bach, Beethoven and Vivaldi, played by the church's music director Margaret Budd on the organ.

The directors of Baltimore Behavioral Health Inc., a major drug treatment provider in Baltimore, have laid off longtime executive William "Kris" Hathaway, as the once high-flying nonprofit continues to cut costs. The board of directors had earlier removed Hathaway as chief executive and put vice president Terry T. Brown in charge of the clinic, which specializes in treating people with both addiction and mental illness. In an emailed response to questions from The Baltimore Sun, board member Jay Miller said that Hathaway was laid off "in the interest of saving money.

Would you take a $100 chance on winning a $1.6 million house? Organizers of an estate home raffle in Baltimore County are betting as many as 35,000 people will step up to buy a ticket, compelled by the unusually big prize - a 5-bedroom mini-mansion on an estate lot in Phoenix - and the chance to help out a local charity. House raffles such as this one have been used as fundraisers by a handful of nonprofits for years, and they are a growing phenomenon as home sellers caught in a recession look for creative ways to stand out and nonprofits seek alternative funding.

Representatives of land trusts and conservation groups are expected to gather May 15 in Columbia for a statewide conference on the challenges of saving land in Maryland. Howard County Executive Ken Ulman is scheduled to keynote the all-day event, which is hosted by the Maryland Environmental Trust . The conference, which runs from 8:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., is open to the public, though it'll cost $60 per person to cover all meals and admission to the sessions, including the trust's award ceremony and celebration.

Oh, oh! Bonuses for nonprofit employees is making news again. The latest issue of The Chronicle of Philanthropy includes a major feature by staff writer Holly Hall on the debate over whether nonprofit workers should be given bonuses.When I advocated bonuses in this column a couple of years ago, I was verbally skewered by some professionals in the nonprofit world. Since that time, the number of organizations embracing bonus systems has increased dramatically. Ms. Hall reports that five years ago a paltry 7 percent of nonprofits had a bonus system in place.

Haven't paid your city property taxes? Then you're on the city's list of owners whose properties could end up in tax sale this May, along with nearly 27,000 others who (as of last week) were behind on taxes, water bills or other city tabs. That's more than 10 percent of city properties, located in neighborhoods as varied as Poppleton and the Inner Harbor . If previous years are any judge, many owners will pay up quickly and avoid tax sale altogether. Here's an interactive map that shows where all the properties are. You can click on the dots for more details, including the address, who owns and how much the city says they owe. (Keep in mind that some may have paid already -- and at least one is an error .)

Beatrice A. "Bea" Checket, who had been head of activity programming at a Westminster retirement community and earlier had established the Women's Business Institute, died Feb. 25 from pancreatic cancer at Gilchrist Hospice Care. She was 67. Beatrice Ann Noppenberger was born in Baltimore and raised in Federal Hill. She was a 1960 graduate of the Institute of Notre Dame and attended the College of Notre Dame of Maryland. She worked as a third-grade teacher at St. Matthew's Parochial School on Woodbourne Avenue and then joined Pratt & Whitney Aircraft in Hartford, Conn.

A three-decade-old Columbia nonprofit group that helps immigrants adjust to life in Howard County is searching for a new director with the departure Wednesday of Jennifer Blake, FIRN's director for nearly the past three years. Roy Appletree, who held the job for about four years before Blake, has agreed to return as interim director until the position is filled, he said. Appletree began Thursday. Blake did not return calls for comment. Nestor Benavides, FIRN's board president, said the change will provide "new blood and energy, and a focus on the future," and was prompted by a combination of tightening finances and Blake's desire to work for a national group.

Enterprise Community Partners, a Columbia affordable-housing nonprofit, said Thursday that it has received a $300,000 grant for community revitalization work. E TRADE Savings Bank earmarked the donation for Enterprise's work in financing affordable housing, rebuilding communities and responding to the blighting effects of foreclosures in neighborhoods.

In the world of small, for-profit businesses, saving your boss a few thousand bucks in postage could very well result in a tidy little bonus in your next paycheck. In larger corporations, money-saving ideas are regularly rewarded with ample bonuses. These incentives encourage employees to take some responsibility for producing a healthy bottom line.So why not offer financial incentives to nonprofit employees? Heresy, you say? Unthinkable in the nonprofit world?"It just wouldn't work" is the phrase I most often hear when I suggest an incentive system, including noncash incentives such extra vacation days for nonprofit employees.

City officials awarded control of a Park Heights recreation center to a nonprofit group Wednesday as part of Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's plan to overhaul the recreation system by handing some centers to third parties. Park Heights Renaissance Inc. will take over operations of the Towanda rec center, which has been closed for repairs since September, when it was flooded by Hurricane Irene. Julio Colon, Park Heights Renaissance's executive director, said his group would run after-school programs, evening sports, and intergenerational mentoring and tutoring sessions at the center.

A nonprofit affordable-housing builder says it will rehab at least 500 vacant Baltimore homes -- in a partnership that includes the Ravens' Ray Lewis -- and intends to start soon. The North Carolina-based Builders of Hope is announcing the "Bring It Home" initiative today. It says it has secured about $100 million from an investor who wants to remain anonymous and plans to use up to $30 million of that rehabilitating vacant homes in Baltimore and Atlanta. Lewis and the United Athletes Foundation are involved in the effort , along with debt-counseling group Consumer Education Services Inc. In Baltimore, Builders of Hope is working with Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's Vacants to Value program.

A North Carolina nonprofit group launched an ambitious affordable housing program Friday to rehabilitate 500 vacant or foreclosed homes in Baltimore near Johns Hopkins Hospital — an area with desolate stretches in the shadow of the world-renowned institution that the city has long sought to redevelop. Builders of Hope and its partners announced plans to invest up to $50 million in Baltimore and Atlanta in a pilot program to repopulate blighted neighborhoods. The group expects to acquire and begin renovating 500 properties in each city into affordable and energy-efficient homes over the next year and a half.

When Heather Ziehl lost her job in sales and marketing operations two years ago due to the failing economy, she became a “true housewife.” And what started as an inside joke about the “Housewives of Bel Air” amongst friends, quickly developed into a full-fledged nonprofit organization helping people build professional and personal connections. “Our mission is basically to bring people together and create awareness about nonprofits and charities. We want to give back to the community,” says Ziehl, 34, of Bel Air. “I'm a very positive person, and I start each day with a positive quote.

The Tony Hawk Foundation has given $25,000 toward the construction of a skateboard park in Roosevelt Park in Hampden. The Skatepark of Baltimore, a nonprofit group dedicated to raising enough money to build a place for area youth to skateboard safely, received one of 12 grants given by the foundation this spring, according to a news release. The group has until the end of May to raise $75,000 in order to get a matching grant from the Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks.

The Baltimore Police Department has decided not to renew a contract with a New York-based nonprofit to provide support to a key training program, with officials saying that the training can continue without paying outside consultants. A $236,200 contract with the Center for Research on Institutions and Social Policy expired Feb. 23, but officials had left open the possibility that the contract could be renewed for a fourth year. The contract paid the nonprofit foundation and its founder, Adam Walinsky, to provide guest speakers and experts and help tweak the curriculum for the department's Diamond Standard Training, which is taught by in-house personnel.

David Ross is a father of two little children, 3-year-old London and 9-month-old Maia. But he's also a father figure to other youngsters through his work as a member of the 5th L, a Baltimore performance poetry troupe that often works with students, according to his wife, Courtney. For that reason, Ross was honored Sunday at a Father's Day Festival, the first such event sponsored by Fathers Rock, a nonprofit group dedicated to showing appreciation for fathers and father figures.

The Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts is accepting applications for its CityArts 2003 Grant Program to promote visual, literary and performing arts in city communities. The program awards two types of grants: Community Arts Projects Grants, which help city artists and nonprofit cultural organizations promote arts discovery; and General Funding Grants, which defray costs for nonprofit cultural organizations. Grant applications are due by 4:30 p.m. Feb. 24. Applications: 410-752-8632 or download one from www.promotionandarts.

Nonprofit organizations looking for the "Rx for Success" should consider attending the Annual Nonprofit Conference on Thursday, March 15, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Chesapeake Center at Harford Community College. The day begins with a keynote presentation by Upper Chesapeake Health President/CEO Lyle Sheldon. Workshops by topic experts from a variety of business areas include ideas for organizing fundraising efforts and making use of emerging technologies. The nonprofit conference is designed for board members, directors, staff, volunteers and other service providers affiliated with nonprofit organizations.

When Barbara Huston took a look at the dilapidated Pasadena building that had been offered as new offices to the nonprofit organization she heads, she was taken aback. "It was very dark, and there was a lot of mold. When I walked through, the carpet — it was like walking through a golf green after it rained. " recalled the chief executive officer of Partners In Care, a 19-year-old agency devoted to helping senior citizens remain in their own homes. "I thought, 'Oh, my God,'" That was last year.