[Nfbmo] More on Heritage for the Blind

James Moynihan jamesmmoynihan at gmail.com
Thu Oct 31 13:30:29 UTC 2013


Et al

The national office should definitely

Jim Moynihanget involved.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <DanFlasar at aol.com>
To: <nfbmo at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2013 6:41 PM
Subject: Re: [Nfbmo] More on Heritage for the Blind


> All,
>      All media outlets are required to  provide a certain amount of
> 'public interest' programming - which can include  pitches from charities. 
> Radio
> and TV stations aren't going to pull an ad  because we say so - they'll 
> need
> some proof - and the best way to go about that  is through the Attorney
> General.   What we have now is citations of  successful suits against 
> Heritage
> for the Blind in New York, Ohio and  Pennsylvania.   Strong evidence, and 
> it
> might make the case but not  until the AG is made aware of it.   I 
> wondered
> in my earlier post  whether the National NFB  should get involved, which
> would mean dealing  with the IRS - no easy feat.   These guys need to be 
> taken
> down but it  will be a long process.  In the meantime, we'll all have to
> work state by  state.
>   More later.
> Dan
>
>
>
> In a message dated 10/30/2013 2:43:54 P.M. Central Daylight Time,
> randycarmack at gmail.com writes:
>
> Gene,
>
> I hate to rain on your parade but my fear is that they  might  already be
> confused between our legitimate cause and the other  organization.
>
> Can't  we just rally support from  the radio  stations to get them to pull
> the advertisements  from these other  guys?  Just a thought.
>
> Thanks,
> Randy Carmack
>
>
> On Wed,  Oct 30, 2013 at 2:03 PM, Gene Coulter
> <escoulter at centurytel.net>wrote:
>
>> One note of  caution---
>> If we go after Heritage for the Blind  and there is  publicity folks on
> the
>> street may get us confused with them and we  might loose donations of 
>> both
>> cars and cash.
>>
>>
>>  -----Original Message----- From: James Moynihan
>> Sent: Wednesday,  October 30, 2013 8:38 AM
>> To: NFB of Missouri Mailing List
>>  Subject: Re: [Nfbmo] More on Heritage for the Blind
>>
>> Gary et  al
>>
>> As I see it the main problem with Heritage for the Blind is  that the
>> average
>> listener can not sort through the  confusion.  The public could donate
> cars
>> to our vehicle donation  program which is legitimate.  I think we should
>> make
>> an  effort to have the atgen scrutinize Heritage for the Blind.
>>
>>  Cordially,
>>
>> Jim Moynihan
>>
>> ----- Original Message  ----- From: "Gary Wunder" <gwunder at earthlink.net>
>> To: "'NFB of  Missouri Mailing List'" <nfbmo at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Tuesday,  October 29, 2013 5:18 PM
>> Subject: Re: [Nfbmo] More on Heritage for the  Blind
>>
>>
>>  Hello, Dan. Thank you for sending this to  the list. I read the
> information
>>> you sent, and if this is in fact  Heritage for the Blind, perhaps we 
>>> have
>>> more of a case than we  thought. We have looked at this before and have
>>> concluded that,  while it is highly unethical, it may not be illegal.
>>> Certainly ABC  news does not claim to verify the accuracy of all of its
>>>  commercials. Heritage for the Blind runs commercials here at least  six
>>> times
>>> a day. Gene Coulter has verified that the  number called can lead to
>>> several
>>> different  numbers.
>>>
>>> As far as I can tell the only thing they do  is operate a website which,
> in
>>> turn, makes referrals to other  websites and uses the publications of
> other
>>> organizations. I think  that what Jim's friend says is quite correct
> about
>>> the fact that  you can enjoy tax-exempt status based on the proclaimed
>>> purpose of  your organization and not on any in-depth study about how
> your
>>>  organization's funds are spent. Of course, I should observe here that 
>>> a
>>> number of people would complain if the Internal Revenue Service  focused
>>> more
>>> on the objectives of the organization.  Some of you will remember that
> they
>>> are currently in trouble for  showing bias against very liberal and very
>>> conservative  organizations, the thought seeming to be that the mission
>>>  statement should be the only thing used to determine whether or not  an
>>> organization should be tax exempt.
>>>
>>> I  don't really know where to take this now. The best information I get
> is
>>> that what they are doing is not against the law. If we could  cause the
>>> Missouri Atty. Gen. to have a different view, this  probably would be a
>>> good
>>> thing for blind people and  for those wanting to donate to us. The
>>> unfortunate consequence of  this kind of activity, however, is that it
>>> subjects all of us to  extra scrutiny and this scrutiny translates into
>>> extra
>>>  time we have to spend making sure that we document the good that we 
>>> do.
>>> You
>>> may remember that a disgruntled woman who was  once one of our members
>>> reported to the Atty. Gen. that we raised  money only to give gifts to
>>> ourselves. It turns out that her  allegation revolved around the fact
> that,
>>> instead of giving  flowers to those in the hospital, we were taking the
>>>  money
>>> we would have spent on them and giving it as a gift card. We  had to
>>> demonstrate to the Atty. Gen. that these expenditures  represented a
> small
>>> percentage of our program services and that we  were not raising money
> for
>>> the purpose of giving it to  ourselves.
>>>
>>> I welcome your  ideas.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Original  Message-----
>>> From: Nfbmo [mailto:nfbmo-bounces at nfbnet.**org
> <nfbmo-bounces at nfbnet.org>]
>>> On Behalf Of  DanFlasar at aol.com
>>> Sent: Tuesday, October 15, 2013 9:19  PM
>>> To: nfbmo at nfbnet.org
>>> Subject: [Nfbmo] More on  Heritage for the Blind
>>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>   I've been following through on the "Heritage for  the Blind"  issue 
>>> and
>>> found that it is only one instance of a large group  of  similarly
> unknown
>>> 'charities' all related to a New Jersey  religious sect called  the 
>>> Oorah
>>> in
>>> New  Jersey.  I'm sending a link that refers to a St. Louis
> Post-Dispatch
>>> story from last year which details a lot about Oorah  based ona
> deceptive
>>> charity called "Kars4Kids".  The  New York Attorney General  identified
>>> "Heritage
>>>  for the Blind" as being another front for the Oorah  sect.  As the
> article
>>> below notes, donations to these websites  have little  if any relation 
>>> to
>>> services for the blind.
>>>    Note that all these false charities seem to all have IRS
> certification
>>> for their non-profit status, but there are numerous  stories from  the
>>> Better
>>>
>>> Business  Bureau noting that they received little or no requested
>>>  information from these 'charities'.  The question is, what do we do
> about
>>> it?  I
>>> don't think we need to spend any  money, get any lawyers  or anything
> like
>>> that,
>>>  but a note to the Attorney General might make a  difference.    And to
> the
>>> point, since this is a national problem, is  it  something the national
> NFB
>>> should get involved in?  Should  the NFB call  out "Heritage for the
> Blind"
>>> as
>>> a  fraud, and if so, how?
>>>
>>>    Here's the link -  it's a pretty disheartening  story.
>>>
>>>
> http://kars4kids-scam.**blogspot.com/<http://kars4kids-scam.blogspot.com/>
>>>
>>>  Dan
>>>
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>>
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>>
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