David Inoue
Larry Oda
As we entered 2025, we realized we needed to address a significant and increasingly regular gap in our budget. It appeared we would be ending 2024 with nearly a half-million budget deficit and a similar expectation for 2025.
The projected deficit was due to lower-than-projected fundraising amounts, which were overly optimistic and reduced due to lack of a full-time fund development staff. Some expenses were also understated in the budget due to an error in calculating the cost of fringe benefits.
Ultimately, the board issued the charge to reduce expenses by $350,000 per year to shorten the deficit and place our finances on a more stable footing going forward without what was seemingly becoming a built-in deficit to the annual budget.
Unfortunately, the majority of JACL’s expenses are devoted to staff that serve the membership and implement our programs and policies.
The most painful decision to be made was to fully cut two full employees, both of whom have been longtime JACL employees. Tomiko Ismail, the membership database administrator, is well known to so many of our members when they are joining or renewing their memberships, making donations over the phone or simply as the frequent public face of JACL for people coming into the office or the person who would always answer calls to the office. Tomiko was the person who we could always count on being present to the local community in the office.
Similarly, Eva Ting, who managed circulation for the Pacific Citizen was likely the first person you would see coming into the P.C. office, and if you had any issues with your subscription, she was likely the first person you would reach out to. She was also vital to managing the many advertisements that support the P.C. financially.
Between the two of them, we have lost nearly a lifetime in experience, as each had been with JACL for nearly 30 years.
Obviously, this reduction is not nearly enough to meet the required reduction. Once the current Daniel K. Inouye fellow completes his current year fellowship, we won’t hire a new fellow to replace him, leaving the Washington, D.C., office with just one fellow at a time. We also reduced hours and pay for select other staff.
Across the board, significant cuts were made to benefits reducing a stipend for health-care expenses but also converting most of the reimbursement to a tax-sheltered health reimbursement account. Retirement contributions are also being reduced significantly. Many of these fringe benefits were intentionally high to compensate for what have been relatively low salaries and wages for JACL staff, which does create concern as to whether employment at JACL will be attractive enough in the future to draw new employees or retain the ones we do have.
In making cuts, we attempted to preserve current salaries and wages as much as possible and make cuts that would not be felt by the staff beyond these initial cuts.
We were fortunate to receive some significant monetary gifts at the end of last year and at the beginning of this year, which provide some breathing room for the current year. These gifts reduced the 2024 deficit and help to shorten the fundraising gap for 2025. Still, among the priorities will be the hiring of a fundraising and membership director, a position that is a job description we have revised and will be reposting imminently.
The cuts we have made only shorten our gap, and without increased fundraising and development, we will continue to operate with a deficit. Our staff is already stretched thin, and we are looking at finding more efficiencies in how we accomplish our work — but those improvements can only go so far.
Know that your JACL staff is committed to our organization in ways that no one unless you are on the inside can truly understand. If you truly value the work of JACL, we need your support now more than ever to enable our organization to remain responsive to the ongoing threats to civil and human rights in this country. Only with your help and the work of our dedicated staff can we continue to work toward becoming Better Americans in a Greater America.
In the meantime, please be sure to express your thanks and support to any JACL staff with whom you might interact..
David Inoue is executive director of the JACL and is based in the organization’s Washington, D.C., office. Click here to read past columns. Larry Oda is national president and resides in California.
