NON-PROFITS ON THE AGENDA TODAY
(JUNKYARD DOG HAS THE SCENT)
At its regularly scheduled study session today (4/10/07) starting at 4:30 p.m. in conference room 1A at City Hall, the Silly Council will discuss CDBG funds for non-profits.
As you may know, many improvers consider some of the non-profits in Costa Mesa to be magnets for illegal aliens and others who are helping keep this city from improving.
Here, in brief, is what you need to know about CDBG funding of non-profits. Remember, this is YOUR money.
Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds are doled out by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The idea behind these grants is to give some of YOUR tax money back to communities so these communities can improve themselves.
This year, Costa Mesa will receive $ 1,401,210.00 (of YOUR money) from HUD in CDBG funds.
A city may, but is not required to, give up to 15% of the total received to non-profits. This is where the junkyard dog comes in.
Under many past liberal Silly Councils, the City of Costa Mesa has traditionally given the full 15% to non-profits.
The present Silly Council is again being asked to give this 15% to a number of non-profits that have asked for YOUR money. The amount of YOUR money that the Silly Council can (but, doesn't have to) give to the non-profits this year will be $ 210,181.50.
The CM PRESS is opposed to giving YOUR money to the non-profits. We believe, as do many others, that it just creates a magnet effect that works against improving Costa Mesa and that this money can be used for other things such as fixing our potholes.
Some try to confuse the council on this issue, but the fact is that the council can use the money for pot hole repair and similar things so long as the potholes are located in low income areas of our city. In other words, the money can't be used to fix potholes in Mesa Verde, but we can use it on the Westside. And, the Silly Council doesn't have to give a dime of YOUR money to the non-profits.
The recommendations to the Silly Council on exactly how much the 3R Committee suggests giving to the non-profits will be given at today's meeting.
The 3R Committee is composed of citizens who have been appointed by the Silly Council over the years. Some members of this committee have been there for many years and have tie-ins with non-profits and activist liberal groups.
Several 3R Committee members are also members of Return to Reason or worked in one way or another to try to defeat Mayor Mansoor and Councilmember Leece in the last election. Some also tried to defeat Mayor Pro Tem Bever when he ran for a seat on the council. A few are directly tied in with non-profits.
Members of this committee have pretty much just handed out your money to the non-profits for years without much investigation.
Then, a few years ago, the Silly Council appointed a junkyard dog to the 3R Committee who rocked the boat. This individual did the unthinkable (at least it was unthinkable to some non-profit bosses).
1. He asked to see the federal tax forms of the non-profits. These are public documents and they reveal the salaries, etc. of those in charge of the non-profits and show links between various non-profits that might not otherwise be seen.
What he discovered was that some non-profit leaders were involved in one way or another with various other non-profits. While there is nothing illegal in this, it did seem to give a clue as to the world views of some non-profit leaders and helped to explain why it appeared that some non-profits appeared to mostly be serving Hispanics, including, presumably, illegal aliens.
He also discovered that some non-profit leaders were making salaries off their "non-profit" work in the range of $ 60,000 to about $200,000 per year and had nice benefits packages for themselves.
2. He asked that the independent contractor who administers the CDBG program for the city to supply copies of the demographic reports that the non-profits must send to HUD. These reports show the race/ethnic breakdown of who ultimately receives YOUR money or services bought with YOUR money.
What he discovered was that the demographic reports showed that some non-profits receiving your tax money didn't look anything like Costa Mesa. One non-profit showed that 100% of its clients were Hispanic. Several others showed that more than 95% of their clients were Hispanic. And, this is in a city whose Hispanic population is only about 35% of the total population.
In addition, he discovered that the non-profits don't ask if their clients are legally in the country or not!
3. During personal interviews, he asked the non-profit leaders some hard questions about why they weren't serving people in anything like the proportion they are found in our community and about their salaries and various other matters, including if they could show any results from being given YOUR money. He wanted to know, for example, why the problems some non-profits were supposed to be helping were actually increasing year after year. It seemed to him that the number of clients served by some non-profits seemed to expand to fill the amount of YOUR money given to the non-profits year after year.
The non-profit leaders, who had been used to soft-ball questions for years, didn't like being held accountable for YOUR money and some complained to the Silly Council.
As a result of their complaints, the council will also consider a new rating system for the non-profits at their meeting today. In our view, this new rating system may be an attempt to keep any 3R Committee members from asking hard questions and seeking accountability for YOUR money.
--Developing---
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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.
