Potemkin Volunteers
Carlson, Tucker
Potemkin Volunteers by Tucker Carlson At the entrance to Thaiss Park, a carefully landscaped patch of grass, trees, and Little League fields just inside the city line of Fairfax, Virginia, stands...
...And why did a federal program charged with rejuvenating fractured communities offer its services to one of the most organized and prosperous suburbs in the region...
...If that doesn't work, the guide advises, "Celebrate and participate in a well-known day or week," or "Link up with another publicity event in your community...
...No problem: "Give an award to an AmeriCorps member or a supportive community leader...
...Yes," she replies, "before it is published, it has to go through our executive director...
...Run out of news pegs...
...After enjoying a measure of bipartisan support since its inception two years ago, the program is facing mounting hostility from Republicans, which is being met by an equal amount of alarmism from the White House...
...Nobody in Fairfax, it turns out, has ever seen an AmeriCorps worker in the park, much less picking up trash there...
...Many AmeriCorps project directors seem to have taken to heart the injunction to go forth and publicize...
...All this self-promotion can be enervating, especially for non-profit groups accustomed to spending most of their time helping actual people...
...But there may be another explanation for the appearance of the mysterious sign: public relations...
...For starters, local charities should "Announce specific AmeriCorps accomplishments...
...The National Endowment for the Arts, which employs 60 AmeriCorps workers, preempted any such snag by hiring a New York public relations firm, the Kreisberg Group...
...After all, "Publicity," the AmeriCorps Media Guide advises, "is simply a means of telling people what you want them to know...
...Nice try, Maria...
...Hence the media strategies and public relations firms...
...Keeping local, state, and federal officials informed about how AmeriCorps is 'getting things done' in your community," it explains, "should be one of your marketing priorities...
...We feel that we need to do more active media advocacy and program promotion...
...Real local charities don't even think to look for a federal grant," says John Walters, whose New Citizenship Project has studied AmeriCorps for the past year...
...In its quarterly report, for instance, the AmeriCorps-funded Real Alternatives Program in San Francisco listed only one difficulty under the heading of "Primary Challenges/Problems Encountered" and it had nothing to do with helping the needy: "Media coverage has been slow at this time," the directors lamented...
...AmeriCorps workers still haven't visited the park...
...For the people who live near Thaiss Park, the sign has been something of a mystery since it appeared late last summer...
...To hear Maria Garin, head of the local AmeriCorps office, tell it, the decision was an accident of geography...
...If nobody notices, "Report your accomplishments at local town council meetings...
...For those who don't get the point, the guide lists ways to make certain the glories of AmeriCorps end up in print...
...Other AmeriCorps projects have boasted of buying radio and television spots and taking out newspaper ads to publicize the program...
...For many erstwhile private non-profits it is a shift in focus whose effects are just beginning to be felt...
...It's hardly an exaggeration-the two predominant groups in the neighborhood bordering Thaiss Park are Korean immigrants and retired military officers...
...Why did the group pledge to clean up a place that is already spotless...
...Putting up self-congratulatory signs in affluent Washington suburbs is just part of the effort...
...For their part, the program's directors have sent word to the managers of the 1,200 local sites that garnering good publicity-that is, convincing the public that AmeriCorps provides indispensable services to neighborhoods-is now a top priority...
...The flacks, noted the NEA in its quarterly report, have "been helpful in the placement of stories in the greater New York metropolitan area...
...Potemkin Volunteers by Tucker Carlson At the entrance to Thaiss Park, a carefully landscaped patch of grass, trees, and Little League fields just inside the city line of Fairfax, Virginia, stands a bright enamel sign mounted on a steel pole...
...If somebody breaks a beer bottle in the park, it's gone the next day" says David Murray, who lives nearby...
...So what is AmeriCorps-or, more specifically, its sign-doing in Thaiss Park...
...Not that there is much trash to pick up...
...Meanwhile, the AmeriCorps publicity machine rolls on, sometimes more smoothly than others...
...They added hopefully that "a Media Committee Speakers Bureau was set up to work in this area...
...Written in easy-to-understand language, the manual makes it clear that charities that accept AmeriCorps money have an obligation to pitch in with the public-relations campaign...
...If all else fails, and your good deeds have failed to make the evening news, "Initiate a new project...
...We basically just picked the park because of the location," she says...
...The city's famously efficient public works department already cleans the park twice a week...
...Killing the program, say administration flacks, means "preventing students from learning responsibility through community service...
...Moments after explaining why she had an AmeriCorps sign placed in Fairfax's Thaiss Park, site manager Maria Garin lays down her ground rules for media interviews: "Just to let you know, before you plan on using this information or my name or the agency's name, it has to go through my executive director and my program director...
...To pique the interest of newspaper feature writers, site managers should pitch pieces profiling budding Stakhanovites on staff- "articles about particularly dedicated and effective AmeriCorps Members...
...Does this mean that nobody is allowed to publish the name of Garin's group without permission from the AmeriCorps directorate...
...The message is clear: Thanks to the efforts of AmeriCorps, the president's new program that pays young people to do public service work, this is a litter-free park...
...Below is the word "LITTER," slashed in two by a bold red stripe...
...Most of the young people we're working with are living in this area, and it was in a good location for them to go and work...
...Littering just isn't done...
...Fairfax's broad assortment of neighborhood associations takes care of the rest...
...AmeriCorps Adopt-a-Spot," it announces in eye-catching letters...
...AmeriCorps is in trouble on the Hill...
...The real problem is that AmeriCorps is funded by Congress...
...So far the location hasn't made much difference...
...But it is hard to blame her for giving it a shot...
...Early this fall, the program's governing body, the Corporation for National Service, sent 5,000 copies of the official AmeriCorps Media Guide to its project sites around the country...
...There is of course some truth in the charge (an organizer for Mississippi Democrat and failed gubernatorial candidate Dick Malpus recruited volunteers at an AmeriCorps site in Jackson this fall, for instance), but liberal bias is not the real problem with AmeriCorps...
...And taking money from Congress requires charities to earn national recognition rather than simply local gratitude...
...Charities that agree to accept AmeriCorps money and workers think about it a lot...
...The stock Republican swipe at AmeriCorps is that the program has been used as a political tool for the Left...
...Every time I turn around AmeriCorps is making us do something that distracts me from my work here," complains a staffer at Habitat for Humanity, a widely respected charity that recently signed on with AmeriCorps...
Vol. 1 • December 1995 • No. 14
