[hn_throwaway_99]

While I agree with you that non-profits can grow to a point that they become sclerotic and lost in their own bureaucracy, I'll give a contrary opinion as to why non-profits that actually want to be effective care deeply about public policy.

For example, consider a simple animal rescue non-profit. While it may on its surface just seem like "this organization should just exist to try to find homes for pets needing adoption", it's actually more helpful to look at a more fundamental question: "What causes animals to be put up for adoption in the first place." It turns out that in most states there are a host of systemic, government-caused problems that are directly responsible for the reasons why many people need to surrender their pets to shelters in the first place. So yes, the animal rescue non-profit is still in the day-to-day business of finding homes for homeless animals, I would say a good organization would actually do more to try to change the status quo and fix the root cause problem, and that often intersects with government policy.