HHS drops plan for `faith-based' set-aside program in Zimbabwe. (People & Events).

Officials at the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have dropped plans to limit AIDS education funding in Zimbabwe to "faith-based" groups, after a protest from Americans United.

The CDC in May issued an announcement that the funding was available. In August, the CDC amended the announcement to list six priorities under the program. The last is for a "multidimensional faith-based organization that can serve as a lead institution for development of behavior change reinforcement materials and strategies to reach church-based youth groups" in Zimbabwe, a nation in southern Africa.

Under the terms of the program, at least $60,000 would be available exclusively for religious groups. Such religious "set-asides," Americans United warned in an Aug. 30 letter to CDC officials, raises serious church-state concerns.

"Instead of allocating grants on the basis of neutral, secular criteria that neither favor nor disfavor religion, the program creates a minimum quota for religious groups," wrote AU Litigation Counsel Alex J. Luchenitser to the CDC. "For the grant program to comply with constitutional requirements, religious and non-religious organizations must be allowed to compete for all program funds on a level playing field."

"This administration constantly claims that religious groups are being discriminated against in access to federal grants," said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. "In fact, the opposite is true. Programs like this show the administration's persistent bias toward government funding of religious organizations."

The Bush administration has been under pressure from religious conservatives to include religious dogma in AIDS prevention programs. The Washington Post reported in mid August that 12 members of Congress wrote to the Department of Health and Human Services to complain about a lack of religious participants at an international conference on AIDS in Barcelona, Spain, in July.

In its letter to the CDC, Americans United noted that it has twice persuaded the Department of Health and Human Services to drop religious set-asides in federal grant programs. The letter requested that the CDC program be amended "so that no religion-related criterion, preference or quota is used to select grant recipients."

On Sept. 27 Americans United received a letter from Dr. Julie Louise Gerberding, director of the CDC in Atlanta, announcing that the faith-based set aside was being dropped.

"After the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's review of funding priorities two and three, the agency's Procurement and Grants Office has decided not to fund applicants based on this Amendment," Gerberding wrote. "CDC will issue a Federal Register Notice in fiscal year 2003 stating that both faith-based and secular organizations are eligible to apply for funding and applicants will be evaluated on neutral criteria that neither favors nor disfavors religion."