Abstract
Organizational capacity has emerged as a critical issue as social service agencies seek to do "more with less." Prior research, however, has failed both to operationalize capacity and to produce empirical support for its perceived positive relationship with organizational effectiveness. This paper describes an effort to create an organizational capacity-measuring mechanism for agencies serving the poor, homeless and hungry, and using simple bivariate analysis, explores the relationship between capacity and organizational effectiveness. Findings here fail to find a significant overall relationship between capacity and effectiveness, though certain elements of capacity appear to be more important than others. The paper concludes with a discussion of potential explanations and their implications for future research.

Michael D. White
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Michael D. White, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and Deputy Director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay. Dr. White's primary research interests involve the police, specifically use of force, training and performance measurement. E-mail: miwhite@jjay.cuny.edu

Christopher Fisher
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Christopher Fisher is a senior research assistant with the Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation Center (John Jay College of Criminal Justice), an adjunct lecturer at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and a doctoral candidate in criminal justice at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His research interests include homicide - particularly bias-motivated homicides, bias crimes, investigative psychology, forensic psychology, and policy analysis and evaluation. E-mail: cfisher@jjay.cuny.edu

Karyn Hadfield
Sexual Assault & Trauma Resource Center of Rhode Island
Karyn Hadfield is a Training Specialist at the Sexual Assault & Trauma Resource Center of Rhode Island and a doctoral student in criminal justice at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Her research interests include the management and treatment of sex offenders, victims of sexual assault, serial violent offending, and post-traumatic stress in first responders. E-mail: khadfield@jjay.cuny.edu

Jessica Saunders
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Jessica Saunders is a senior research assistant with the Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation Center (John Jay College of Criminal Justice), a graduate teaching fellow at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and a doctoral student in criminal justice at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Her research interests include advanced statistical modeling, homicide and sexual violence. E-mail: jsaunders@jjay.cuny.edu

Lisa Williams
Children's Services Council of Palm Beach County
Lisa Williams is the planning and policy analyst for the Children's Services Council of Palm Beach County and a doctoral student in criminal justice at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Her research interests include sex offender legislation and public policy, juvenile delinquency, and psychiatric co-morbidity and substance use drug abuse treatment. E-mail: lwilliams@jjay.cuny.edu