Every year Attorney General Martha Coakley issues a report on charities that hire professional fundraisers and every year a smattering of stories are done about how most of the money at some of the charities goes to the fundraiser and almost nothing to the cause itself. The Tampa Bay Tribune now takes the story national, identifying the 50 worst charities in America in terms of money going to the actual cause.
Coming in at No. 1 is the Kids Wish Network, which ostensibly raises money to benefit dying children and their families. The Tribune, working with the Center for Investigative reporting, found that only 3 cents of every dollar raised actually went to dying children. Over the last decade, $110 million was pocketed by the charity’s fundraisers and $4 million went to the founder and his consulting firms. Overall, the Tribune says, the 50 worst charities paid their fundraisers $1 billion over the last 10 years.
The attorney general’s report is far less sexy, yet the message is almost identical. Many Massachusetts charities hire professional fundraisers who pocket the lion’s share of the money that gets raised. Overall, according to the 2011 report, charities using professional fundraisers solicited $388 million in donations, of which $190 million, or just under half, ended up going to the charitable cause.
One way to make sure your money is going where you want it to go is to check out the charity’s finances. Do it yourself by reviewing the tax forms charities file (go to Guidestar or, if the charity is based in Massachusetts, try the attorney general’s database) or go to a website such as Charity Navigator, which does the analysis for you.
Charity Navigator ranks charities based on their spending, their transparency, and a host of other indicators. It also uses its database to make some interesting comparisons. For example, it just released a report ranking the 30 largest philanthropic marketplaces in the nation. The report ranked San Diego No.1, Indianapolis No. 30, and Boston right in the middle at No. 15.
–BRUCE MOHL
BEACON HILL
The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center awards a $95.5 million grant to UMass Amherst, State House News reports (via WBUR).
Court Administrator Harry Spence and Judge Paula Carey, the new Chief Justice of Administration and Management, tell Emily Rooney their plans to modernize the state’s trial courts by, among other things, digitizing documents and allowing cases to be filed online. NPR’s Nina Totenberg interviews former SJC chief justice Margaret Marshall about her now-famous decision on gay marriage.
Chicago shows Gov. Deval Patrick some love by naming a street in his old South Side neighborhood after him.
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell pays what she calls an $800 “ransom” to access EBT records; a Herald videographer tags along.
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
A close ally of Lawrence Mayor William Lantigua is arrested and charged with stealing proceeds from a city-owned garage, with some of the money allegedly being deposited straight into Lantigua’s campaign account. Lantigua’s lawyer says the mayor knew nothing about it, the Eagle-Tribune reports.
The three-member Plymouth County Board of Commissioners is taking heat from some selectmen for doubling their annual stipend from $7,500 to $15,000.
Not a single parent or other member of the public showed up for a Haverhill School Committee hearing on the system’s $90.5 million budget for next year, the Eagle-Tribune reports.
A member of the Marion Conservation Committee resigned from the board in the wake of being fined by the state Ethics Commission for violating the conflict of interest law.
NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON
In an odd reversal, the Obama administration is finding its best allies among conservative Republicans and its harshest critics among fellow Democrats, including many in the Massachusetts congressional delegation, as the administration defends on national security grounds the widespread monitoring of phone records. It now appears the NSA and FBI were mining data from nine Internet companies, including Google, Facebook, and YouTube, the Washington Post reports. The Wall Street Journal reports that phone data mining wasn’t limited to Verizon; the NSA swept data from all three major cell carriers, as well as credit card companies. The New York Times spotlights Glenn Greenwald, the lawyer and journalist who broke the domestic surveillance story for the Guardian.
The American Prospect says the Republicans’ “solid south” is no more.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has tapped Jeff Chiesa, the state’s Attorney General and a fellow Republican, as the temporary fill-in for the Senate seat of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg. Like his soon-to-be temporary Massachusetts colleague, Sen. Mo Cowan, Chiesa said he will not run in the special election for the seat this fall.
Mitt Romney hosts his own “Experts and Enthusiasts 2013” conference in Utah.
ELECTIONS
National Review columnist John Fund calls on conservatives to get behind Gabriel Gomez, even though he’s not one of them, because he has a chance to win. In interviews with the Globe, Gomez and Democratic rival Ed Markey stake out contrasting views on foreign policy issues, including the civil war in Syria and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Herald isn’t playing along with Boston Mayor Tom Menino’s command to “be nice” to the city he’s run for the past two decades, as the paper piles the Boston Redevelopment Authority with a two-page spread on the intermingling of development and politics. Boston magazine earlier this month called on the city’s next mayor to shutter the agency.
EDUCATION
Several Boston public schools have received troubling letters that ramble on about Al Qaeda, Nazis, and weapons of mass destruction, but officials say there is no evidence to suggest students at the schools are in actual danger.
The Weymouth School Committee voted to hike the cost of school lunch by 25 cents because of declining sales this year they attribute to federal regulations mandating healthier choices.
TRANSPORTATION
A Randolph woman who told police she didn’t want to be late for work because of traffic was ticketed for driving in the restricted HOV lane on the Southeast Expressway with a doll strapped in a car seat.
ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT
The Patrick administration is spending millions in electric ratepayer funds to shore up a key subsidy for the state’s solar industry, CommonWealth reports.
State shark scientists are relying on donations and grants to fund tagging and other research activities involving the big fish.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Globe columnist Kevin Cullen is a wee bit skeptical of Whitey Bulger’s professed reason for trying to keep him from covering the gangster’s trial. Peter Gelzinis traces Bulger’s downfall to a broken promise Bulger made to a South Boston drug dealer, who went to the feds after Bulger failed to make mortgage payments on the dealer’s house. The lawyer for Bulger’s FBI handler, John Connolly, calls Bulger’s claim that he wasn’t an FBI informant “laughable.”
Doctors at Bridgewater State Hospital say a 20-year-old Weymouth man accused of killing his mother, sister, and his mother’s boyfriend is not competent to stand trial.