Bruce Dorpalen, public affairs director for ACORN Housing, is now lobbying Congress, requesting $60 million in taxpayer dollars for HUD housing counseling programs.
Despite powerful evidence of massive irregularities at ACORN Housing, HUD, headed by longtime ACORN ally Shaun Donovan, has funneled $729,849 so far this year to the longtime ACORN affiliate.
HUD ruled that ACORN Housing had severed its ties to ACORN, which allowed the government to do an end-run around the ban on federal funding of ACORN that became law in late 2009.
The grants were handed over despite an audit that showed ACORN Housing was incapable of managing the federal grants properly. “We have determined that [ACORN Housing] lacks the accounting capacity to manage the size and complexity of the [foreclosure-avoidance] program funds,” said the internal audit by NeighborWorks America, a taxpayer-funded federal nonprofit.
NeighborWorks America is a business name for the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corp., which was created by Congress in 1978.
ACORN Housing had poorly trained staff, sloppy accounting procedures and violated conflict-of-interest guidelines established by the Office of Management and Budget, according to the internal audit by taxpayer-funded NeighborWorks America. The audit was provided late last year to then-Senate Banking Committee chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT).
ACORN’s state chapters have restructured themselves and do business using names such as New York Communities for Change and Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment.
The NeighborWorks audit also determined that although ACORN Housing and voter fraud-prone ACORN are separate legal entities, several financial transactions “evidence extensive relationships between both organizations that may undermine claims of an ‘arm’s length relationship’ between them.” ACORN Housing, said the audit, worked closely with ACORN and subcontracted much of the counseling work to “four ACORN local state chapters.”
It’s business as usual for the Obamacrats as none of the above mattered to the Obama administration when it started cutting new checks to its old community organizing friends earlier this year.”
The NeighborWorks audit was made public only because watchdog group Cause of Action pressed it to release the report.
***Ed Randazzo, is a nationally syndicated author. He has been a conservative activist and consultant for over 30 years and is currently the Chief News Editor of Life and Liberty Media***
