This year the focus is on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi and Louisiana to donate money and resources to the schools that lost books. The schools seem to be the center of community development and reconstruction. At the heart of a quality community is quality schools.

We're near the bottom nationally, but we're near the top in improvement. We have a long way to go, but we're definitely making those trends.

There is a lot of uncertainty on the Coast.

The mission (today) is still the same -- evangelization. The focus of our work is still what are the best ways to spread the good news in the black communities. ... What has changed is how we go about responding to that mission.

Everyone should have enough money to get plastic surgery.

Three hundred million is a tiny drop in the bucket. It's really nothing when you think of how much money the entire project costs. That's what makes us nervous. These projects are so expensive. Are they ever really going to get funded? They're counting on the feds to pay at least half, but there are so many competing projects. We're very worried about whether these projects will really be built.