DC bureaucracy meets bad philanthropy
Pros
There are many great projects that come through the grants review that should get funded, even partially, because they really would help connect people with history, literature and public programs. The people who come to NEH from outside DC are fortunate to have a real passion for the work and want to do well, even within the confines of government bureaucracy.
Cons
Unfortunately, NEH is weighed down like many humanities departments in academia by the old hats who want things to always be as they were. Keep in mind that anyone who says "we've already done it like that 20yrs ago" has been working for the same organization for so long they are calcified. There are many staid ideas about what is possible which have no basis in the present. Even with the uncertainty around the budget (NEH and NEA are constantly under threat of being axed from the Federal budget) there were many who argued that anything new or repeated from years ago was not possible. After 2017 or 2018 I heard many old hats retired (which also tells you how old they were) and there could be new voices that are being heard in this tumultuous time of the Trump administration. To be perfectly honest, my experience under Democratic leadership was positive in that staff and management wanted to help everyone and push out money everywhere, but that was impossible to do and made things really messy. Republican holdovers from prior administrations were much more clean and clear about what they wanted to do, and how they would not spend money on projects that they felt were below the highest standard. Keep that in mind if you think that NEH is immune from the wiles of politics.
