DELAYING RETIREMENT
Outon sticking around to help local nonprofits survive COVID-19
On March 12, Peggy Morrison Outon carried a few files out of her office at the Bayer Center for Nonprofit Management, Downtown.
The COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to bear down on Western Pennsylvania, and she was prepared to shelter in place and work remotely for a couple weeks.
Four months later, she’s still connecting to colleagues and clients on Zoom calls from her North Side home. Because the nonprofit sector has taken a severe hit from the coronavirus, Ms. Outon’s planned retirement in May was postponed indefinitely.
“Frankly, I can work,” she said. “Travel is out. My health is fine.”
Ms. Outon, 70, is assistant vice president for community engagement and leadership development at Robert Morris University and founding director of the Bayer Center, which launched 20 years ago at RMU to conduct research and provide education and training for nonprofits.
The pandemic has proven to be among the most challenging times in the sector’s history.
Many nonprofits were forced to shut down or scale back operations, cancel revenue-producing programs and fundraisers and lay off staff.
Most had to pivot operations. For instance, some whose mission wasn’t connected to food quickly mobilized resources, staff and volunteers to take care of people in need, Ms. Outon noted.
Bible Center Church in Homewood, for instance, realized some vulnerable families in its neighborhood didn’t have transportation to sites designated by Pittsburgh Public Schools for “grab and go” meal distributions, so the church organized direct delivery of the food to homes.
The church and others “have been utterly engaged in pandemic response,” said Ms. Outon.
“I’m so moved by the generosity and courage of these groups. It’s wonderful — and painful at the same time.”
Communities in need
Approximately 8,500 nonprofits operate in a 10-county region of southwestern Pennsylvania that includes Pittsburgh, according to the Center for Charitable Statistics.
About half are located in Allegheny County, including health and human services agencies, education providers, faith-based organizations and arts groups.
The Bayer Center estimates it has worked with over 3,500 nonprofits. Many are so small they file short versions of federal tax returns instead of the standard 990 form required of larger nonprofits.
During the pandemic, Ms. Outon has counseled nonprofits to avoid hibernation and continue to
respond to community needs — even with diminished staff and resources.
“That’s our job,” she said in a phone interview this week. “Our community is in serious turmoil and bruising. There’s been job loss, job insecurity and enormous amounts of change. This is a time to really realize what difference we make and the difference we need to make.”
Nonprofit leaders and staff have been eager for help. Though the Bayer Center had to cancel or postpone 26 classes scheduled for March through May, they began offering some online and generated “three times the enrollment,” said Ms. Outon.
After the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, 360 people registered for a virtual class on how to deal with issues of racism in nonprofits.
The response prompted two sessions, and many participants “didn’t want to hang up” when the allotted time ran out, said Ms. Outon.
Going forward, many in the sector are worried about funding.
The foundation community has stepped up with millions of dollars in emergency grants.
Thousands of nonprofits in the region also received loans from the Paycheck Protection Program that was part of a $2 trillion COVID-19 federal stimulus package passed by Congress in March.
But those are stopgap measures that may keep employees working and bills paid only in the short term, said Ms. Outon. Reduced donations from individuals experiencing job loss or pay cuts along with budget shortfalls at the state and municipal levels also threaten nonprofits.
“There’s been a steady reduction in government funding for nonprofits over time,” said Ms. Outon. “And now we have needs that are bigger than God.”
She’s encouraging clients to consolidate, and though she avoids the term “merger,” that will likely be the fate for some groups, she said.
Building a resource
A Texas native, Ms. Outon spent more than two decades working in management roles at art museums and nonprofit management centers in Austin and New Orleans prior to being recruited to lead the Bayer Center.
“She’s spent her whole career in the sector and really has a lot of insights into things that work and don’t work,” said Rebecca Lucore, who was working for Bayer Corp. when it became naming sponsor for the nonprofit center at RMU.
“Peggy being who she is has agreed to stay on because these are turbulent times,” said Ms. Lucore, who now heads sustainability and corporate social responsibility for Covestro, a plastics and materials maker that spun out of Bayer in 2015.
“I think she feels strongly that the work is more important now than ever.”
The Covestro Center for Community Engagement, also housed at the Bayer Center, provides opportunities for corporate employee volunteerism and trains individuals to serve on nonprofit boards.
“Nonprofits really see the centers as such a resource, and so much of that comes from Peggy and her leadership and knowledge,” said Ms. Lucore.
The Richard King Mellon Foundation seeded the Bayer Center in 1999 with $250,000, and the center’s budget now totals $1.4 million annually.
Its eight-member staff is scheduled to relocate from Downtown to offices on RMU’s Moon campus before the academic year begins — a move planned pre-COVID-19 to save costs.
With plans still in flux about how RMU will handle COVID-19 restrictions on campus for students and employees, “We’re working to figure out a hybrid of virtual and in-person work,” said Ms. Outon.
One certainty for Ms. Outon is she plans to remain in Pittsburgh postretirement. She and her husband, Paul, live in Perry Hilltop in an 1874 Victorian home he has restored.
“Paul has touched every inch of this house inside and outside,” she said. “One of the things I’ve loved about Pittsburgh is that there’s a real sense of ownership and community here.”