Layoffs at Focus on the Family

Focus on the Family is cutting an estimated 20 percent of its staff, as critics question the groups priorities.

Critics are holding up the layoffs, which come just two months after the organization’s last round of dismissals, as a sad commentary on the true priorities of the ministry.

“If I were their membership I would be appalled,” said Mark Lewis, a longtime Colorado Springs activist who helped organize a Proposition 8 protest in Colorado Springs on Saturday. “That [Focus on the Family] would spend any money on anything that’s obviously going to get blocked in the courts is just sad. [Prop. 8] is guaranteed to lose, in the long run it doesn’t have a chance — it’s just a waste of money.”

Layoffs before the holidays? Looks like someone forgot to focus on their OWN family!

Focus on the Family spent more than $500,000 to write discrimination into the California Constitution. And one of their board members contributed an additional $450,000 in cash.

This is the third year that Focus has laid off employees due to budget cuts. In its heyday, the ministry, which relocated to Colorado Springs from Arcadia, Calif., in 1991, employed more than 1,500 people. Many of those employees worked in mailroom and line assembly jobs, processing so much incoming and outgoing correspondences that the U.S. Postal Service gave Focus its own ZIP code.

Things might be tough for them right now, but it would be dangerous to write off groups like Focus on the Family. An Obama administration will (sadly) boost their fundraising ability.

But for now we can simply say: "Hey Dobson, focus on your OWN damn family!"