Council tackles nonprofit funding

After years of wrangling over how and whether Sonoma should fund local nonprofits, the City Council Wednesday night agreed to try settling the matter once and for all.
Mayor Joanne Sanders and Mayor Pro Tem Ken Brown will head an ad-hoc committee composed of city staff and representatives from affected community groups to develop what Sanders called a “long-term, strategic plan.” The committee is expected to report its findings at the council’s May 21 meeting.
Sonoma is currently on a two-year budget plan, and tight finances have meant that local non-profits will receive no city funding in fiscal 2008/2009. The council last year adopted a “two-tier” system, with the Vintage House Senior Center, Valley of the Moon Boys and Girls Club and Sonoma Ecology Center in the first tier and seventeen others in the second. The organizations funded provide many community services that might otherwise be handled by a municipal parks and recreation department.