Probe finds Army charity is hoarding millions

Probe finds Army charity is hoarding millions

www.msnbc.msn.com

Between 2003 and 2007 — as many military families dealt with long war deployments and increased numbers of home foreclosures — Army Emergency Relief grew into a $345 million behemoth. During those years, the charity packed away $117 million into its own reserves while spending just $64 million on direct aid, according to an AP analysis of its tax records.

The massive nonprofit — funded predominantly by troops — allows superiors to squeeze soldiers for contributions......

(visit the link for the full news article)

It isn't clear from the article whether AER is supposed to loan out or give away relief funds. What is clear is the charity "violates its own rules by rewarding donors." The article goes on to state that AER has a 12 year reserve of funds when 1-3 years is considered prudent. The AER also received an 'F' grade from the American Institute of Philanthropy.

The AP findings include:

Superior officers come calling when AER loans aren't repaid on time. Soldiers can be fined or demoted for missing loan payments. They must clear their loans before transferring or leaving the service.
Promotions can be delayed or canceled if loans are not repaid.
Despite strict rules against coercion, the Army uses pushy tactics to extract supposedly voluntary contributions, with superiors using language like: "How much can we count on from you?"
The Army sometimes offers rewards for contributions, though incentives are banned by program rules. It sometimes excuses contributors from physical training — another clear violation.
AER screens every request for aid, peering into the personal finances of its troops, essentially making the Army a soldier's boss and loan officer.

This doesn't look good.

www.msnbc.msn.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Wow, just another horrible thing coming out of the wood work!

Add Madof and the Stanford kobackle, this sure is a cruddy beginning to the year.

There is no true CHARITY anymore. When you have the heads of the Red Cross and Salvation Army, to name a few, making HUNDREDS of thousands of dollars in salary, all sorts of shady stuff going on under the cover of "AID" and "RELIEF" etc...its sad and disgusting. People join these orginizations for the easy cash...NOT to help those it was intended for.

If your involved with these orginizations and are caught taking money, using and abusing donations for personal gain, OR turn it from CHARITY into a money MAKING machine, your time here is done...IMO. Yeah and for those of you who know me...you know exactly what I mean.

reply to post by rcwj75


I appreciate your sentiment. It pains me to think an organization set up as a non-profit to aid military families would turn into an additional burden to add to the difficulties already heaped on the average soldier.

It seems so many of these types of programs actually operate counter to their intended purpose these days. Not a good trend.

reply to post by rcwj75


I've never seen a charity or government welfare program that wasn't full of fraud and corruption. People slam Ayn Rand about her condemnation of self-sacrifice, but this is exactly what she was talking about. She warned that when somebody tells you to sacrifice you'd better look to who is accepting the sacrifice. Soldiers can't afford to make "donations", yet here is an organization coercing the sacrifice of personal property for the "common good". Funny how the "common good" usually means the enrichment of the self-appointed elite. People would be better off keeping their own money and providing for their own families. But then you would be a free and independent man, not a controlled peasnat.

Why do people act so surprised by this, and seem to be totally naive to this until it's in the media?

Here's a, I guess little known fact, EVERYTHING that has ANYTHING to do with money is CORRUPT to the core....People put into positions of power involving lots of cash just can't help themselves. The whole system is set up to perpetuate greed.

Now you know that you won't be surprised anymore...

If we really wanted to feed the starving millions, we could do it right now. We have the resources to do this. Capitalism keeps those resources scarce to keep prices up. Feeding the world would mean capitalism would have to fail. As the economy worsens the more artificially scars resources become, and prices go up, creating yet another capitalist catch 22. No one is willing to lose money, because we force capitalism into every situation. It's like a tool used for the wrong purpose. Trying to solve the problem of starvation/poverty using capitalism just isn't working.

Hungry conscience, hungry stomach, which do charities really feed?

I stopped giving to most charities a long time ago. My pet hate is the charity collecters that harrass you in the street when walking through the city center.

Dunno if you get them in the US, but anyone in the UK will know the guys i'm talking about.

My friend worked for one and got paid £7 an hour plus bonus (i don't remember what the bonus system was). He had a target to sign up 5 people a day to donate at least £5 per month each to Shelter.

You do the maths. He wasn't collecting as much as they paid him! How can that be viable??? They've got teams of these people hounding shoppers in the city center. They'll even follow you down the street spouting their 'sales pitch' even after you've told them no.

I told one of them i would never sign up with street collectors because they get paid more than they collect. The guy said surely that can't be right, or why would they have him doing it? I told him to go think about that for a bit.

I only give directly to those that need it. We run a charity night every 3 months for a street kids shelter in India. 100% of what we make gets transfered straight to the shelter's account. My friend goes to India and visits them so we get to see where the £ gets spent. Last time we sent them the funds it saved a 5 year old boy's life who was dying of pneumonia. That's powerful stuff and real charity.

The AER should be forced to release the funds, or loose it's charity status.

reply to post by rcwj75


Not sure where you got your information but the heads of The Salvation Army don't make hundresd of thousand of dollars.

You can go to The Chronicle of Philanthropy to verify.

Graft masquerading as charity isn't really a new concept.

But unlike like the bailout bills at least they attempted to hide it.

Such a sad state of affairs.

:shk: