Be careful with people around pots of money

There is a well-known and oft-misquoted passage from the Bible, in 1 Timothy 6:10, that says, “For the love of money is the root of all evil.”

The sentiment expressed means that people need to be very careful around money, and not allow it to lead them astray, which happens all to often. That’s not hard to understand in a society that increasingly values riches over morality.

Charities or single-issue groups also need to be watched closely. The American people are exceptionally generous and give tens of billions of dollars to charity every year. About 80% of the money collected by charities comes from individuals.

Individual Americans donate seven times the amount to charity than their European counterparts and the average American gives 3% to 5% of their income to charity. Unfortunately, there have been too many cases where the charity doesn’t always use those donations properly.

Perhaps the most well known recent case of misfeasance came to light about 10 years ago, with the Wounded Warrior Project, when the CEO and COO of the charity were both ultimately fired for the mishandling of $800 million in donations on lavish parties, travel, conferences and other luxuries.

In a Fox News article from 2016, it was reported that watchdog group Charity Navigator found that only 60% of Wounded Warrior’s annual budget, which was $340 million in 2014, went toward veterans, while other vet organizations routinely spent more than 95% on their mission of helping vets. Since the scandal, Wounded Warriors has cleaned up its act, but the damage done to its reputation will be lasting.

There are many other cases of charity misfeasance and malfeasance, some of which you can read about on the Charity Watch website, all involving sizeable charities, but what about those smaller 501(C)(3) charitable organizations that fly under the radar? The truth is that the Internal Revenue Service does a very poor job of policing those organizations, because there are just too many of them.

One small “charity” that apparently escaped IRS scrutiny existed right here in Franklin County awhile back. This 501(c)(3) was established about 50 years ago and outlived its need but continued to exist until 2014.

During the period of 2003-2014, the organization took in $406,596, of which 76% ($308,451) went to the charity’s director in salary and benefits and another 23% ($92,885) was spent on office expenses. Over the same 11-year period, only $7,349 (1.8%) of the organization’s revenue was spent in support of its mission, and those expenditures seem pretty suspect. Did the IRS ever look at this questionable organization’s balance sheet? I doubt it.

What the above case proves is that even though a charitable organization might have been formally established with all of the right paperwork, it is no guarantee that it will be operated with the best of intentions.

That being written, what about all of the little groups that pop up to deal with local community or charitable issues?

Since most of these groups are geared toward a single temporary issue and are local, people rightly feel comfortable donating to them or otherwise helping out. For instance, we recently donated to and attended a fundraiser for a family in great need. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind how the funds would be spent because the whole effort was transparent.

On the other hand, there was recently an effort to solve a community problem that required time and money, and as usual, people responded in good will. This effort also required the hiring of legal counsel, so a hundred or more people contributed to that end.

In the end, the group was successful in its mission and ended up with a large amount of money in the bank, probably north of $12,000. The group had no official standing or leaders, but “someone” decided that the donations would be refunded on a pro-rata basis or the balance remaining would be given “to a local establishment.”

Contributors were given a choice, so some opted to get a refund, but without polling the group, a few self-appointed leaders decided that the balance of the money, after refunds, would go to a local recreational organization, one that charges people to use it. No one was asked for suggestions as to where the donation should go, and efforts to find out who made the decision were met with silence. One wonders why the decision-making process is so opaque.

In the end, be generous, but also be careful with where your money goes.

Dwight Weidman is a resident of Greene Township and is a graduate of Shepherd University. He is retired from the United States Department of Defense, where his career included assignments In Europe, Asia, and Central America. He has been in leadership roles for the Republican Party in two states, most recently serving two terms as Chairman of the Franklin County Republican Party. He has been an Amateur Radio Operator since 1988, getting his first license in Germany, and is a past volunteer with both Navy and Army MARS, Military Auxiliary Radio Service, and is also an NRA-certified firearms instructor. In his spare time, he dabbles in genealogy and learning new languages.

This article originally appeared on Chambersburg Public Opinion: Be careful with people around pots of money