|
Call
to Action
Request
an Investigation of UMCOR
Have
you been wondering what UMCOR is going to do with your portion of the
$17,000,000 donated to their 9-11 fund? Are you dismayed that the UMC
leadership turns a deaf ear to inquiries from the membership about the
fund? Maybe what we need here is a review by an independent organization,
but this won't happen without your help!
The BBB Wise Giving Alliance
was formed in 2001 with the merger of the National Charities Information
Bureau and the Council of Better Business Bureaus Foundation and its
Philanthropic Advisory Service. The BBB Wise Giving Alliance is a
501(c)(3) charitable organization, affiliated with the Council of Better
Business Bureaus.
The BBB Wise Giving Alliance collects and
distributes information on hundreds of nonprofit organizations that
solicit nationally or have national or international program services. It
routinely asks such organizations for information about their programs,
governance, fund raising practices, and finances when the charities have
been the subject of inquiries.
Please contact the BBB Wise Giving Alliance about
UMCOR, as public inquiries are their gauge for action:
The volume of public inquiries helps identify
which national charities will be the subject of a BBB Wise Giving Alliance
Report. If you have a question about a specific national charity, check
our Reports page, or contact us for a free copy of our written report on
the organization. Even if we do not have information on the organization,
the request will help alert us to national charities that should be the
subject of a future review.
As you can see below, they have not received
enough inquiries about UMCOR to justify an investigation.
Click here for a form to
make your inquiry.
Here is an example of an inquiry already submitted
to the BBB Wise Giving Alliance, and below is their response.
Dear BBB Wise Giving Alliance:
The United Methodist Church's General Board of
Global Ministries' division called UMCOR has solicited funds since
September 12th in the name of helping victims of 9-11.
So far, UMCOR has collected more than $17
million (as you can read here
http://umns.umc.org/02/feb/037.htm ), and yet they have distributed
hardly any of this money, and based on the past history of UMCOR, they
will NOT distribute all of this money (and its investment proceeds)
according to the desires designated by the donors. The past history shows
that UMCOR sits on the donations for years and even decades in order to
gain investment income, because this income becomes "undesignated" and
goes into their general funds, where they spend the money at their own
whims.
The following websites demonstrate the amount
of the fund and how little has been distributed; and by the way, midstream
in the solicitation of funds, they changed their beneficiaries to be the
Afghans instead of the American victims of 9-11:
http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/emergency/wtc.stm
http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/loveupdate/faq.cfm
As you can see near the top of this page,
http://www.gcfa.org/FundBalances1999.pdf UMCOR had assets in 1999
(latest available) of $24 million and much of this is in unrestricted
funds, which they build up by NOT distributing contributions for a LONG
time, in order to gain investment income.
And the response from the BBB Wise Giving Alliance:
From : "Paxenos, Dina" <dpaxenos@cbbb.bbb.org>
Subject : RE: Charity Inquiry
Date : Tue, 19 Feb 2002 10:06:39 -0500
Dear Inquirer:
Thank you for contacting the BBB Wise Giving
Alliance. This is in response to your request for information on a
nonprofit organization.
Unfortunately, due to lack of inquiries,
the Alliance has not developed information on this organization.
We have logged your inquiry and should we complete a report in the future
we will send you a copy.
If you would like to investigate an
organization further, please contact the offices of your state attorney
general or secretary of state.
In addition, for more wise giving information,
please see our "Tips On..." publications at:
http://www.give.org/tips/index.asp
Please do not interpret any information
contained in this response to reflect approval or disapproval of any
organization. The information is provided solely to help you use your own
judgment.
If you have any further questions or concerns,
please feel free to contact us. We look forward to assisting you again in
the future.
Sincerely,
BBB Wise Giving Alliance
As a part of the Body of Christ, using your
spiritual gifts of discernment as well as diligence is what God calls you to
do. Please be prayerful, and don't be timid when it comes to standing up in
the name of Christ. |
