Read and comment on this message that was sent out over the Peace Corps Fund network written by RPCV John Coyne who also testified at the hearings in support of the new Peace Corps legislation at:
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Peace Corps Fund
Update #2
On June 25, 2002, Barbara Ferris and I testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps, and Narcotics Affairs about the Peace Corps Charter for the 21st Century Act and to support Section 10 of The Act which provides $10 million dollars for RPCVs to conduct 3rd goal activities. This legislation was introduced on Thursday, June 20, 2002 by Senator Chris Dodd S - 2667 and has been co-sponsored by Senators Ted Kennedy, Gordon Smith and Robert Torrcelli. It was introduced in the House on Thursday, June 20, 2002 by Congressmen Sam Farr and Mark Udall.
We testified as co-founders of the Peace Corps Fund on a panel that also included Dane Smith of the NPCA. The NPCA and the Peace Corps Fund were the only two RPCVs groups asked to provide testimony the Committee on Foreign Relations. Along with former Peace Corps Director and RPCV Mark Schneider, Dane Smith, Barbara and I stated our support for this new legislation.
Senator Dodd chaired the subcommittee and made the point that he hoped to have this Act passed by this July. The first witness before the Committee was Director Gaddi Vasquez. Director Vasquez has not initially given support for the new legislation, asking for more time to review the Act. Senator Dodd also asked Director Vasquez if he was committed to the independence of the Peace Corps from the Freedom Corps or any other federal agency and initially, the Director did not answer the question. Senator Dodd and Congressman Chris Shays who was also at the hearing asked Director Vasquez for his assurances that Peace Corps would remain independent of any other federal agency. The Director said that he supported the independency of the agency. Senator Dodd urged Director Vasquez to come back to him with his comments. The Director said he would.
In giving our testimony, Barbara and I concentrated our remarks on the structure of the fund, the wide range of projects it would support and need to pass this legislation which would provide necessary resources to RPCVs to do Third Goal activities.
As we have outlined in our emails and brochure, the Peace Corps Fund was created at the urging of thousands of RPCVs and former staff. It is non-profit organization incorporated in the District of Columbia and founded to support programs, projects and activities of the Third Goal conducted by RPCVs. Acting as a grant making organization, PCF will support RPCV groups and/or individual RPCVs throughout the United States who want to do Third Goal programs, projects and activities.
The Peace Corps Fund in not a membership organization, we will not engage in peace making activities around the world, we will not publish a quarterly magazine, and we will not create or manage programs. The Peace Corps community has a membership organization, the National Peace Corps Association.
In beginning our effort, the Peace Corps Fund is proud to join a long list of national organizations of RPCVs and staff engaged in such work, beginning with the non-profit Committee of Returned Volunteers (CRV), formed in 1966 as the first alumni association of volunteers. The Peace Corps Institute was established in the 1970s to create several directories of Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff. In 1979, eight years after the CRV disbanded, the National Council of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers was founded. (it was from this group that came NPCA). Other early non-profit groups were the Peace Corps Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Foundation, founded in 1986, and RPCV Writers & Readers which I started with Marian Haley Beil in 1989. RPCV Writers & Readers, now http://peacecorpswriters.org networks writers and has produced several bibliographies of Peace Corps Writers, and funded the editing of Living on the Edge: Fiction by Peace Corps Writers that was published by Curbstone Press in 2000.
As the bill stands now, it will provide funding through the Corporation for National Service to non-profit organizations established in the District of Columbia that would serve as fiscal agents to provide grants to support RPCVs engaged in Third Goal work. The Corporation will make the decision on which nonprofit organizations would receive grants.
This is where you come in -- all of the RPCVs who are in this network are now a strong and powerful force to reckon with and Members of Congress and their staffs are listening to us.
As RPCVs, we recently made our voices heard loud and clear in the halls of congress and now we are respected for who we are and what we stand for. After you read over the legislation, we are asking you to contact your 2 US senators and ask them to so sponsor S-2667 - The Peace Corps Charter for the 21st Century Act.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query
This site will give you the bill. I have also attached it as a word document.I am also attaching Barbara's testimony as well as my testimony.
We will continue to update you as we move forward with building the organization. Please forward this Update #2 to everyone on your list of RPCVs and friends of the Peace Corps. As we seek to have this bill passed, we will contact you with more information and phone #s.
Thank you.
John Coyne
Peace Corps Fund
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