Baltimore ? Fundraising troubles are forcing the NAACP to cut its national staff by a third, but the situation is nowhere as dire as the organization’s financial problems in the 1990s, a spokesman said Thursday.

The venerable civil rights organization is simply “rightsizing,” spokesman Richard McIntire said.

About 40 positions will be cut from the NAACP’s 119-member national staff through layoffs and attrition, McIntire said. The organization is also considering closing some or all of the seven regional offices run by its national headquarters.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is dealing with the effects of lower fundraising revenues over the past few years, said McIntire, who emphasized the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights organization remains solvent.

The organization’s situation should not be compared with the 1990s, when the NAACP faced “many outstanding debts,” McIntire said. The moves also do not affect the 2,200 local chapters, which handle their own finances, he said.