WASHINGTON (ABP) — President Bush has chosen a low-profile think-tank leader to head the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.
Bush announced Aug. 3 that he had tapped Jay Hein, currently president of the conservative Sagamore Institute for Policy Research. The group, which Hein founded, is based in Indianapolis.
Hein also serves as vice president and chief executive officer of the Foundation for American Renewal. His biographical sketch on the Sagamore Institute's website says that group “provides financial grants and other support to community-based organizations and educates the general public on effective compassion principles and practices.”
In the White House statement announcing the hire, Bush praised Hein. “Jay has long been a leading voice for compassionate conservatism and a champion of faith- and community-based organizations. By joining my administration, he will help ensure that these organizations receive a warm welcome as government's partner in serving our American neighbors in need,” he said.
The White House's faith-based office coordinates the administration's efforts to expand government funding to churches and other small religious and community organizations to perform social services. The plan — once the centerpiece of Bush's domestic agenda — has proven controversial to supporters of church-state separation. It has repeatedly been stonewalled in Congress. But Bush has implemented much of the plan through executive orders and regulatory action.
Hein takes the job from Jim Towey, who held it for more than four years. He announced in April that he would resign to become president of St. Vincent College, a small Benedictine Catholic school in Pennsylvania.
After Towey resigned, critics of the initiative called on Bush to dismantle the office. They repeated those calls after Hein's appointment was announced.
The Washington-based Interfaith Alliance issued a statement noting that “neither Mr. Hein nor anyone else can solve the inherent problems in this program. This office violates the First Amendment by creating government-sponsored religion, paid for by all taxpayers no matter what their faith and beliefs; and it violates civil-rights laws by allowing religious discrimination in hiring and in providing services to those in need.”
A recent study of the initiative by an independent government agency criticized the initiative. The Government Accountability Office concluded that many executive-branch agencies administering faith-based grants did not have adequate safeguards in place to ensure the funds were being used in ways that comport with the Constitution's ban on government endorsement of religion.
-30-