Daily News Roundup: Inside a College Development Office Riven by Dysfunction

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Sees Giving Drop Amid Fundraiser Churn: Shirley Ann Jackson, the upstate New York university’s highly paid president, has set what The Chronicle of Higher Education terms a “toxic” tone that has seen roughly half of the institute’s 70 advancement employees leave over the past three years and sent three vice presidents for development packing while alumni donations dwindle.

Major Hospitals Grow and Charity Care Drops Under Obamacare: Operating revenue at the nation’s seven top-rated nonprofit medical centers rose 15 percent from 2013 to 2015 while their uncompensated treatment fell from $414 million to $272 million and overall community-benefit spending was flat, according to Politico. Claims of community service were central to hospitals’ lobbying a decade ago to preserve their tax exemptions, Politico writes.

Bloomberg columnist Megan McArdle says those trends are not a bug of the Affordable Care Act but a feature, boosting hospitals’ bottom lines by ensuring more patients are insured and can pay their bills. But she notes that the dwindling need for charity care is fueling debate over what now constitutes hospitals’ community benefit.

“Catalytic Philanthropy” Could Hold Key to Reducing Worldwide Waste: A philanthropic approach that’s open to investing in small businesses to tackle global problems could effect a sea change in pollution control by helping communities more cost-effectively recover and reuse waste products, particularly the plastics clogging the world’s waterways, the head of a conservation charity writes in GreenBiz.

Ex-Mass. Governor Finds Next Act in Managing Impact Investments: Deval Patrick, who joined Bain Capital after leaving office in 2015, talks to The Boston Globe about the firm’s $390 million Double Impact fund, which aims to deliver profits to investors who back ventures that promise social benefits in areas such as sustainability and community health. Read a Chronicle special report on the growth of impact investing among foundations and charities.

New York Councilman Set to Head Big Social-Service Charity: David Greenfield will not run for re-election in his Brooklyn district this fall and will instead become executive director of the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty, a $30 million nonprofit that runs government-funded programs for the poor and elderly and is recovering from a financial scandal, Crain’s New York Business reports.