Ethics Scenario #10: Down By the Old Main Stream, Inc.

10. Jasper is the executive director of a nonprofit organization that serves severely disabled children. A generous donor has provided a $1,000,000 grant to the society to provide for a camp serving such children, but only for that purpose. Jasper was in the middle of a painful, but necessary process of shutting down a respite care program serving the parents of severely disabled children because of a lack of funds. Knowing that it would take several years before any new camp could be established, and scores of parents would be severely affected by the loss of services provided by the respite care program, Jasper decides to temporarily divert some of the funds from the camp grant to keep the respite care program from shutting down, justifying this in his mind by the fact that this diversion is temporary until replacement funds could be found, no one would find out about this, that much more good would be provided by the organization by doing this, and that the use of this money is certainly consistent with the mission of the organization to serve those who are severely disabled.

a. Is Jasper acting ethically by temporarily diverting funds from the grant for this purpose?

b. Are there any other alternatives he might consider if he feels uncomfortable with diverting these funds?

c. If he chooses to divert these funds, even temporarily, should he be disclosing this to anyone?