The Malcolm Baldrige Program needs our support!  Your Congress intends to de-fund this program that is vital to our community. It is vital that you contact your local Senators and Representatives to express your belief in the continuity and sustainability of this program. 

Below is a suggested email/letter for you to use in your actions:

“Dear XXXXXX:

As you address the budgets for fiscal year 2012, I would like you to stop and recognize a program that is very critical to our country.  The Baldrige Performance Excellence Program was established by Congress to ensure that U.S. industries would thrive despite the serious global challenges back in the 1980s.

Here we are again in a very challenging time and the Baldrige Program could again help get our economy back on track.  The Baldrige process benefits the United States by driving economic development through increasing business productivity, workforce efficiency, and job creation.

The House Appropriations Committee has proposed zero funding for the Baldrige Program for fiscal year 2012. Funds are available within the National Institute of Standards and Technology proposed appropriation to reallocate to this small program.

I strongly urge Congress to consider funding this program.

The Baldrige Program is recognized as one of the most successful public-private partnerships in government today. Annual operating costs of the program stand at $9.9M, and the Baldrige Foundation supports the program at an annual expenditure from its endowment of $1.5 to $2.0M.

I must point out that there is an apparent misconception that the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program is primarily an awards program. While the Baldrige Program is widely known for managing the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, its main mission is to provide education and global leadership in promoting performance excellence.

In fact, the awards are only the culmination of the evaluation process that scores of organizations undertake each year, both at the national level through the Baldrige Program and through many non-funded parallel state and local programs.

These evaluations are supported by efforts of thousands of volunteer experts who help these organizations improve their performance and competitiveness. It is estimated that these volunteers, leaders from all sectors or our economy, contribute over 120 hours each annually, collectively 149,000 hours at a conservative estimate of value at $8.8 million, to improving U.S. organizations, as an act of patriotic service to their country. 

Beyond this, countless other organizations use the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence as a framework for improving their operations. This widespread usage is evidenced by the approximately 2,000,000 downloads of the Baldrige Criteria annually. In addition, an economic study revealed that the Baldrige Program’s social benefit-to-cost ratio is 207-to-1. The program’s net private benefits to the economy as a whole have been conservatively estimated at over $24.65 billion since inception, compared to its social costs of over $200 million.

And in another study it was concluded that “More than any other program, the Baldrige Award is responsible for making quality a national priority and disseminating best practices across the United States.”

The Baldrige Foundation has commissioned a reprise of the social benefit-to-cost ratio study this year, and it is expected that the ROI will be even significantly higher since the last time the study was done. The study will be completed by the end of 2011.

Furthermore, the program has been emulated by numerous national award programs throughout the world, which use the Baldrige Criteria for their own national quality programs.

As stated earlier, the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program is a role model, public‐private partnership, so it is not entirely funded by the government.  It’s the only U.S. public-private partnership dedicated to improving U.S. organizations so they can compete globally. It educates business, education, health care, and nonprofit organizations on best practices in performance excellence.

The Federal funding is in fact, only a small measure of the total amount of hours, funding, and value contributing to the Program. Yet the government support is significant as it provides the integrity, consistency, and continuity the program needs. Without an efficient and effectively managed program, the entire stakeholder system would collapse.

I urge you to vote to invest in the Baldrige Program.  It is one of the best investments taxpayers can make to promote economic growth, improve America’s competitiveness, and contribute to the goal of reducing our national debt and deficit.

Thank you for your attention to this important matter.

Sincerely,

XXXXXXXX”

The following is a list of contacts that your voice will have the most effect on (primarily Rosa DeLauro, due to her seat on the committee related to funding.) 

House:
Rosa DeLauro - 202-225-3661 ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ) Appropriations
John B. Larson - 202-225-2265 Ways and Means
Joe Courtney - 202-225-2076 Agriculture, Armed Services, Ethics
Jim Himes - 202-225-5541 Financial Services
Christopher Murphy - 202-225-4476 Foreign Affairs, Oversight and Government Reform

Senate:
Richard Blumenthal – 202-224-2823
Joe Lieberman – 202-224-4041

For more information on the Malcolm Baldridge program, please visist the website below:
http://asq.org/advocacy/issues-actions/support-baldrige-program.html

Thank you for your support
ASQ Hartford