Founded in 1888 as Travelers Aid, the Heartland Alliance for Human Needs and Human Rights calls itself “the country’s premier service-based human rights organization.” And while federal law may say they’re a charitable organization, the truth is that the majority of the income for their “humanitarian” work comes not from charitable contributions, but from taxes.
According to its latest annual report, (PDF) in 2006 the Heartland Alliance took in $53,380,652 in revenue, 74.4% of which came from “grants and contracts” from government agencies such as the City of Chicago, the Illinois Department of Human Services, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the U.S. Department of State, and many other local, state and federal agencies.
Only 13.3% of Heartland’s revenue came from charitable contributions.
Now, Heartland is after a $1.87 million Department of Homeland Security grant to purchase a home in the outskirts of Chicagoland to establish a second group home for juvenile aliens who arrive in the U.S. unaccompanied. Local residents around the proposed site are outraged and opposing a zoning variance because they think the children are going to be a problem. But Heartland’s existing home in Chicago has not only proven not to be a problem during its 11 years in operation, but the neighbors around it actually volunteer there.
Many of the children who arrive in the U.S. unaccompanied are refugees or victims of human trafficking. Others are children whose parents are detained at the border for criminal charges or immigration violations. Homeland Security sends these children (PDF) to group homes such as Heartland’s to await deportation proceedings or resettlement.
But the problem is not that Heartland Alliance is doing humanitarian aid. The problem is that you’re forced to pay for it whether you want to or not, at the point of the taxing authorities’ guns. Exactly what is charitable or humanitarian about this?
Another problem is that by accepting government blood money, the Heartland Alliance is working against its own stated purpose of countering poverty. A study (PDF) released this month shows that the states with the highest tax burdens also have the highest levels of poverty. California, at the rate it’s increasing taxes on its own people, is set to be the poorest state in the country within a few short years. Illinois, also with a high tax burden, isn’t too far behind.
What this really does is to make more people poor, so that Heartland Alliance and other misguided organizations like it need more money to provide poor people “services” which most of them would never have needed without the government policies which made them poor and keep them poor!
How much more could we contribute to charities doing real humanitarian work, were we not forced to subsidize not only those organizations, but massive government bureaucracies besides? Winning the War on Poverty is simple. All that needs to be done is to get the government out of it entirely, and let We the People handle it ourselves.
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Karl Marx would love the popular moves among politicians in various state governments and the federal government to ban so-called "junk" food in schools, and to "put healthy food in" convenience stores and on the tables of those they define as poor. It's a very elitist and arrogant mindset that promotes this ideology, and it needs to be addressed.
Ultimately, the war supporters in Congress prevailed in the vote on the resolution. Still, the vote was significant because it places every member of Congress on the record as supporting or not supporting the unconstitutional, costly, violent occupation of a country that never attacked us. This vote should serve as an important reminder to the American people of where their representatives really stand when it comes to policing the world, empire building, and war.
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Q
Dec 26, 2006
maybe we need a war on poverty, we seem to have a war on everything else and it makes everything else worse so why not at least if we finally hit bottom, we can finally move up
Ray
Dec 27, 2006
I guess the question becomes do we as a people need the government to be providing these services, and are they providing them in an economic manner?
In the case you are specifying this organization is entering into a contract with the government, and providing a specific service for a specific amount of money. In one way this is the same as selling government guns for the border agents, or more to the point it is like providing janitorial services.
Several organizations for the disabled of various forms I know of provide various government agencies with cleaning services using their clients. While one may argue that these government agencies have no business existing (one I know of certainly I have a question if these should exist) there is little argument that any office that exists will get dirty and need cleaning. These organizations provide these services in a cost effective manner.
From what I can read here in the same manner this organization is providing a specific service to the government. For a set amount of money they are operating a place where the government can place children whose immigration status is at issue. Sending them to an adult jail would be really bad. On the other hand, just releasing them and or sending them out onto the streets without adult supervision would also be a really dumb idea on more levels than I can count. . So the government has to put them somewhere.
We could have the government run their own facility for this. What to talk waste fraud and abuse???? They could use some facility that is use for other purposes, but what would match? Or they can have a private concern manage it. It could be a for profit or a not-for-profit. In this case a not-for-profit.
So one has to wonder exactly where the problem is here?
Rob
Dec 27, 2006
Unfortunately, we have had a “War on Poverty” since LBJ in the 60’s. Like the government’s other “wars” it has just created more of what it was purported to eliminate, at the cost of our Natural Rights.
(1) Extorting money from others through threat of force is wrong, regardless of the reason.
(2) Such programs are illegal, at least on the Federal level. (There is no authorization in the Constitution for “charitable activities” by the Feds, and since the Constitution is supposed to be the Supreme Law of the Land that would make anything done by the Federal government which is not specifically authorized illegal.)
Ray
Dec 28, 2006
Rob:
The dictionary defines giving as “to present voluntarily and without expecting compensation”.
In this case the money is “presented” to this organization for a specific purpose and with a binding expectation of the compensation of operating a home for under age immigrants who we can’t let out on the street. This is the sale of a service.
So I guess I will have to be more specific in my question:
What is the problem with the Federal Government hiring a not-for-profit to provide a service which it needs and for which the government is getting a better deal than they could get elsewhere?
As far as the constitutional authorization, I do see this is dealing with immigration and the control and regulation there in. So I can’t see that there is any question that this is Constitutionally as function of the Federal Government.
So you still have not explained the problem to this expenditure.
Michael Hampton
Dec 28, 2006
This isn’t a government contract; it’s an outright grant.
Rob
Dec 28, 2006
Actually, the Constitution does not authorize the Congress to control and regulate immigration. Article I, Sec. 8 clause 4 delegates the Congress to “establish a uniform rule of naturalization.” That’s not the same thing at all, since the clause only authorizes them to provide a standard rule throughout the United States for becoming a citizen (instead of the individual States making their own separate rules.)
Even if we accept the claim that regulating immigration is inherent in the power to standardize naturalization, the
Constitution still does not authorize the Federal government to give away charity to immigrants or anyone else, either directly or through private agencies.
Ray
Dec 28, 2006
We can argue if the congress has the right to do the immigration thing. We can argue if the right thing to do with incoming aliens who are underage is to place them in a home like environment until we can determine what we are going to do with this. Frankly I think securing our our borders is a duty inherent in the constitution. Certainly if securing the borders is authorized, securing all people crossing them until the are entire caused to leave or are authorized for admission is to some extent the definition of securing the border. But that is my view. I suspect that this is something you disagree with.
But the reality is that you appear to know nothing about the grant system. According the the article above (which is all I have to go on):
Now, Heartland is after a $1.87 million Department of Homeland Security grant to purchase a home in the outskirts of Chicagoland to establish a second group home for juvenile aliens who arrive in the U.S. unaccompanied.
This is a grant TO PURCHASE … TO ESTABLISH. I have worked in the not-for-profit world. I can assure you that this check did not just come. It was the result of a signed grant CONTRACT (which is labeled as a “contract”) which specifies exactly what is to be done with the money. Federal Grant contracts are some of the longest there are. There are deadlines for things to be done, and a reporting procedure for insuring that this is completed. If that money doesn’t buy the house, or if that house is not then established for the purpose specified then the directors of the organization who signed the contract will be asked some very pointed questions. If they don’t come up with very good explanations they could end up in jail.
So this is not a gift as you are implying, but indeed a contract. As I said we can disagree if the housing of immigrants until they are admitted or returned is the duty of the federal government. But there is not much room to allow for you position that even if this is permitted that this contract is not constitutional.
Michael Hampton
Dec 28, 2006
Whether it’s Constitutional or not (and you all can debate this if you wish), the fact remains that it’s utterly immoral and wrong.
These people will never get a single dime from me.
Ebony Ghost
Jan 01, 2007
I could be mistaken, but I don’t believe Chicagoland is an amusement park in the Arizona desert. So, for me, the most glaring question is why there are enough illegal aliens from south of the border; close enough to Canada to justify the expense.
That said, the point of the article concerns charity at gunpoint. If the majority of the “charity’s” funding is from people who would face prison for withholding those funds, it should be obvious that those providing the funding are doing so for other than charitable reasons. The Constitution does not grant the power to contract gifts to charity. Or, in this particular circumstance, what will ultimately be a series of gifts. It’s bad enough that the people of Illinois would be asked to foot the bill. Even worse that the burden would fall on the citizens of Florida or Hawaii.
Ray
Jan 01, 2007
Ebony:
Sorry but you have missed several points here, so I guess that is why you missed the main point.
First I know that this is a major shock to you, and certainly may be outside of what you can understand but not all aliens are “illegal”, and not all are in fact from “South of the Border”.
Second not all arrests of aliens who are “undocumented” occur at the location that they enter the US. It would be nice if we could stop everyone who is entering without permission at the point that they enter, but we appear to only stop a minor fractions of them, so they would cover a great deal of the US.
Third this means that there will in fact be people in this country under various statuses which related to immigration who need to be detained. Some will be here illegally and are going to be returned. Some will have an issue and will have become “excludable” while here legally. Others may be here and their status needs to be clarified. Given the size of Chicago one would assume that there would be at least a few of these.
Fourth Chicago is actually a major “port of entry”. A rather large number of foreign nationals enter this nation through the various places in Chicago (mostly but not exclusively the airport). By the process of the law of averages some of these will be in some manner a problem.
Now many of these that are a problem will indeed be returned immediately to the country or origin. But in some cases which given the sample size is a fairly large number, there is a problem where they are not returned. Example, a friend applied for a visa and waited and worked through the process at the US consulate for his area of his country for over a year. As soon as he got his newly minted VISA on his passport he immediately got to the country’s only airport. After several plane changes he was in the US, incidentally at Chicago. It turns out that he was speedier than he should have been. In order for his VISA to be valid the completed and approved application had to be on file in Washington. The consulate only sent these to the embassy every week, and he had gotten his approval the day after the last batch left. The Embassy only sends these two the states once a week, the day before the shipment arrives from the consulate. So he was supposed to, but nobody told him, wait two weeks before catching that plane. So he had to spend two weeks in a US federal detention center. Luckily he had gotten approval for the whole family, but had decided to get settled and get a place to live before they came over so they were a month behind him. Had they been with him, his three children would have had to have been detained for two weeks. One would assume that they would have ended up in the other facility that we are talking about here.
Which does bring us to point five. There is a facility that this organization is running for the Government which is presently at capacity. So they are simply expanding their existing capacity of the location. The fact that you don’t catch this is probably a good indication of your inability to process the details of this situation.
Now if this was a facility to provide homes for children without parents or the like I think you would have a point. Frankly our federal government funds a lot of things they should not have their noses in. But in this case this is directly a case of funding the protection of our borders.
This is a situation very close in nature to one of the shelters here for the “mentally challenged”. A major portion of their funding comes from the federal government. It comes from the Marine Corps. The form that this funding comes in is in the form of purchases. They got an original grant for the equipment to manufacture parts of Marine Uniforms that the Marines were having trouble getting on a reliable and cost effective manner. (If you want to argue that the original grant was bad constitutional law I will not argue the point ;-) ) So someone with the shelter came up with a plan and pitched it to the Marines. Buy us the equipment and you would get first dibbs on production. We will sell the items to you at a good price, which they do. The last year they have been so busy they are turning away other business, and are running a third shift of those who are down on their luck but not mentally challenged just to keep up with orders. But I am sure you are going to call this giving to charity too???? :-)
Fraud Guy
Jan 02, 2007
As the source for sending this article in, the main reason I oppose this purchase is that it is a waste of money to buy a luxury estate (with pool, granite countertops, etc.) to house these children, when a portion of the funds could be used to buy a different facility in the Chicago area (there is a massive unused facility that was once run by the Archdiocese of Chicago much closer to the airports), and the rest of the funds either could be turned to more valid expenses (such as US children who need help) or not spent, and thus dropping our tax burden. Again, I do not oppose the contract/purchase in general, but as a specific expense that is unwarranted.
Ebony Ghost
Jan 03, 2007
Ray:
You are much too kind. I had to go read the article again and, if it is concerning anything other than charity at gunpoint, my tiny mind is still reaching for straws. You may wish to try again.
My opening statement was clouded by memories of Vincente Fox’s campaign stop in Chicago when he was running for office. Silly me. Perhaps he was only there for the opera. And then there are the tens of thousands who turned out in the streets to protest H.R. 4437. Now, before you jump to conclusions, I don’t think everyone in the crowd was illegal. Neither do I imagine that all of the illegals in Chicago were present. But, that’s another story.
Had you attempted to chastise me for not reading the referencing article submitted by Fraud Guy, you would have been correct in an assumption. The information in that story would have spared you the comment about south of the border because the thirty children it mentions are from China and India. It will probably operate like their Rogers Park home where the children “stay for about 60 to 90 days while pro bono attorneys work to legalize their residency and staff members try to place them with relatives in the country or in foster homes.” It may be safe to say the purpose of this particular facility IS to “provide homes for children without parents” and that I may have a point. Of course, this all depends on a general agreement of what the word unaccompanied means.
This doesn’t negate the “what are they doing there” question. It merely changes the focus. Are these children stowaways or did somebody purchase a ticket for them on an international flight? It would cost a lot less than $1.8 million to send thirty kids anywhere in the world. and we know where in the world these are from. No. There is more brewing here than simple charity and we shouldn’t have to pay for it.
Finally, I’d like to address your last point. If I have this correct, the shelter received a one time grant to purchase a means of production. They are using the machinery to employ Americans with low prospects of obtaining employment. And, they finance their operations with the proceeds from selling what they produce. While I would label the motivations of the shelter providers as charitable, I cannot call the revenue they receive, charity. Their situation is more closely related to producing widgets for export. They just happen to be using their resources (not ours) to provide charity.
Ray
Jan 03, 2007
Eboney:
Given the quality of this last post I think that giving your brain credit for being able handle anything as weighty as a straw is over stating its ability.
I am not sure why you are even bring up the issue of Fox, but since you did. Many Mexican citizens are living here in the US and they are allowed to vote in Mexican elections. Much like Americans abroad can vote in US elections. I would expect that many of those here are here illegally, but many more are here legally. I know this is a concept that you will probably not be able to lift with your brain’s ability to handle weighty issues. But those who are here illegally try and not be noticed, and so probably are not as likely to vote as those who are here legally. So the people Fox was campaigning to probably were legals. And one has to wonder why you would have side a morbid problem with this.
You were the one who brought up the south of the border. I did not. I just pointed out to you that it was false like pretty much all of the rest of the stuff you post here in this thread.
I would assume that yes that many of these children probably have legal representation who are attempting to provide them with legal entry into the US. Your problem with people following the law is???
Many other of these children as the article points out did come here with their parents. Their parents are in adult detention, which is another word for standard jail. One would hope that you actually can grasp the straw sized concept that it is unwise to lock up children in a facility with murders and rapists and pedophiles. I hope you can also grasp the straw sized concept that it is also unwise to just permit them to wonder around the US without supervision. So it would take only the ability of your brain to lift two straws at once to understand that the government needs a facility to handle this problem.
To immediately send them back maybe not even to the right location and without a parent. Now that is the workings of a brain that can’t handle two straws at once. If you were paying attention to the article and its research materials you would find that some of the children do not have a specific location they were from. So what do you do buy a ticket and send them on the first plane leaving the country for somewhere? Also if you are going to send them back without their parents even if you know the country of origin, how are you going to get a child through the plane transfers and the like necessary to make it back to their home country. How about to their home town? This is going to require a professional escort. Guess what we have an example of the cost of this in a recent public extradition. Your 1.8 million would cover about 10-20 kids at the going rate. Is it possible that your brain can indeed grasp that dropping an unaccompanied child into many of these nations without adult support is an even dumber idea than dropping them into our society?
I don’t know if you noted that most of these children will be eventually legally admitted. So it seems pretty dumb to send them away at the cost of about $100,000 only to require them to then return.
So maybe you can understand that this is a service that the government is going to have to contract for or provide itself. So this organization is contracting to provide these services. So it is the same as the example I gave.
How about a different example. As we all know if we pay attention to the news the cost of an escorted air transfer is about $100,000. So if we are going to constructively murder these children by sending them home and this organization can provide this escort service for $50,000 is that something that the government should do. Or is that illegal charity?
Fraud Guy
Jan 04, 2007
Ray,
The bigger point is that if we wish to have a facility to handle these children, we don’t have to buy a luxury estate to do it. In Illinois, there are other properties (even one owned by the Catholic Church that is currently almost vacant and that has many acres of open land) which could be bought or leased at a much lower price.
In addition, the neighbors of the location will see their property values drop precipitously (more than the dropping real estate market), and then there is another 20 acre parcel next door that will not likely be turned into housing typical of the neighborhood.
Finally, the zoning board is not allowing public comment before their vote, the funding has changed from Homeland Security to Health and Human Services, and the Senior Senator from Illinois sits on the biggest advisory board for this Heartland organization.
It seems like the story about the children is obscuring other issues, but a basic repudiation of this plan just covers one thing–our tax dollars do not have to be wasted to pay for this home, when other, less expensive methods can be found.
I don’t want to get into how DHS can allow 5000 unaccompanied minors into the country by plane each year, when you can’t take your own soda onto a plane–though you could take KY. I also don’t want to get into the complete lack of sympathy here for the 100,000 unaccompanied kids who come over from Mexico each year–we’ll treat them to Texas county jails, but kids coming in by plane get a luxury resort? Why?
Ray
Jan 05, 2007
Fraud Guy:
Well yes I do wonder about the use of this facility. But from having been on the other end of these programs I can see that there might be some reasons for this. Don’t forget that as you would know if you researched the material given in the above article that one of the requirements is that this be a secure facility in a secure neighborhood. Basically this is required to be a private jail. I would doubt that the options you listed would meet this requirement. I would think that I could come up with a facility that would do the job better for less money than this, but one has to at least allow for an explanation.
The zoning issues certainly do apply. But they would apply regardless of who bought the property and used it for this purpose. At some point this will have to be chalked up to a NIBY problem. It has to be in someone’s back yard.
I will not argue that the kids in the Texas facilities are being treated as they should be. One does as I say have to wonder about the nature of the facility, but certainly a reasonable facility is needed for both situations.
As for allowing 5000 children on planes unaccompanied, I would doubt that this is the number that got ON the plane unaccompanied. So especially teenagers would in fact have arrived unaccompanied, but if you read the articles carefully this number also includes children who arrived with an accompanying adult, but who for one reason or other was detained. Since the adult or adults were being sent to a actual jail which would be unsafe for children the children with them were now “unaccompanied”. This does not mean that they were excluded, just that they were detained. Our INS/nowICE system is a total mess. As I pointed out with my friend’s experience. I also know of a incident a decade ago which I doubt has improved, where an associate arrived during a storm that delayed some flights. So the line at the entry point was pretty long. When the time for shift change came the INS (at that time) didn’t have the personnel for an additional shift, so everyone still waiting for entry was “secured” (IE: jailed) until they could be processed. The first priority was to process current incoming passengers, so they were in a kind of limbo for over a day until a lawyer got involved. So no 5000 children doesn’t suprise me. You just have to understand the system and how it DOESN’T work.
All of this deals with if there was waste or fraud involved, and not the claim that the very funding was wrong. The claim keeps being made that this was a gift to a charity from tax money, which it was not. Frankly there is a lot of smoke for waste and fraud in this funding. I am just not sure if there is a fire there or not. ;-)
Fraud Guy
Jan 05, 2007
Another round of zoning board comments was allowed last night at the meeting; the director of this program from DHHS was present (flying in at who’s expense) and explained that the neighborhood was not too expensive–they also have 2 program homes in the Galleria in Houston, and one down the street from Bush 1’s home. She also had to point out to the local crowd that their multi-million dollar homes were mere shacks compared to homes near their other program homes. This reinforces the point that we are spending money to buy homes in the most expensive neighborhoods in the country to run this program–what kind of cost effective decision is that?
The head of the program for Heartland Alliance pointed out that their rate of pay is similar to other programs around the country. Since I am aware that Illinois DCFS funds residential programs at @ $4000/month/child (agencies with children in foster homes receive $3300-$3600/month for services for special medical/psychological needs children), one of the higher rates in the country (we have looked into interstate adoptions and the rates states pay while children are in foster care) his claim that their receipt of $5400/month is average struck me as odd.
When the local rates for care were brought up, the DHHS representative glared at the Heartland exec, who scrambled to come up with the above rebuttal about the National Rates (i.e. what DHHS usually pays?).
Heartland is a government contractor. Their status as a not-for-profit corporation does not mean that they don’t make money via salary and other compensations, especially since they have a high number of volunteer workers.
This is not NIMBY. One commenter in a nearby, much more modest neighborhood asked to move the home to his area, because it would be a waste to spend this much money for a luxury home when a more modest community would serve. The members of the neighborhood, many affluent through their own efforts, and who are very active in charities with both their time of money, basically decried the waste of money this program represents (before they knew of the other multi-million dollar neighborhoods they place such homes in.
I think the biggest issue I have is the attitude of DHHS & Heartland. It was reflected in the arguments for this proposal repeatedly hammered that it was for the children, and these rich people just don’t want to help (although none volunteered their own neighborhood for the project). One person was quoted locally to say that since “they” don’t have to pay for the purchase, why are the neighbors complaining?
The problem is, they are paying for it, as are we all. The DHHS rep tried to calm funding fears by saying that the funding wasn’t from the local or state level. But if you pay federal taxes, it is coming from your pocket. And you have a right to be heard.
Ray
Jan 05, 2007
Fraud Guy:
It does sound like a waste. I would agree with the analysis if it were not for one thing: if the information in the articles referenced in the article are correct then there is an issue of secure custody.
According to the information originally provided these homes were specifically for children who were in custody. I worked in a home where children had to be secured. In this case they were witnesses, which is I admit very different. But at the same time I know the facility had a lot of expenses which a normal facility would not. Example as a staff member I was fire arms trained with several types of weapons. When on the job as strange as it sounds we were required to always be armed with side arms. The facility did have an “armory” which would make many a military unit envious. We were expected to defend the facility if it was attacked, and were equipped to hopefully do so. (It never came up) Not to make to much of a point of it, but we were also paid a lot better than other child care workers doing this kind of work with nonsecured children because of the fact we were expected to be ready to take this risk. When the children were transported anywhere, which was rare and normally only for medical treatments and the like, it was with additional armed security. Those guys were even more expensive than we were.
At the same time we did provide a home type environment for the children in our care. Since as I hinted the children almost never left the facility there were a lot of additional costs in this area. We had what today would be a middle of the road, but at the time was a seriously top of the line home theater. We had a small but very well equipped playground. (which was also hidden from view) Of course we had our own “home” school facility. All because taking the kids to any thing was strictly a no no.
I hoped with the location research for an additional facility. The facility itself had a lot of additional locational requirements. These included being in an area where it would be unusual to have people from outside of the area. The general location had to have multiple entrances and exits with ease of verifying the lack of a tail before final arrival. Also it was a consideration of if the neighbors could be bribed to participate in actions. (The facility in question was located in a exclusively religious location, but I can see locating in a very rich neighborhood meeting this requirement frankly I like the religious solution better but …) The facility had to be large to meet some of the needs discussed above, and had to have a 1500 foot buffer on all sides of the facility with a inconspicuousness fence around that buffer. At the same time the facility had to not look out of place in the community. I would think that a middle class neighborhood would not allow this to happen. At the same time the location had to allow for a serious very quick police backup. In my experience it was ten minutes to eight cops on scene and more on the way. The SWAT team could be on scene and deployed within thirty minutes. Which may sound like a lot, but is a pretty quick response especially to a location that meets these other requirements.
Now I am going to admit that some of these requirements probably don’t apply. They are listed as an example of additional expenses that relate to providing all the foster care services which would be covered by the costs you list, while at the same time operating in a secure manner. I don’t know the requirement that are included in these facilities. In the facilities I worked with the actual location was one seriously important secret. Obviously this is not the case in this case. But I would think that some buffer zone, having a large facility that would also blend into the neighborhood would be a logical requirement. But I am only guessing. I am saying that the description of the needs would include additional expenses.
More expenses generally means more expensive. I realize that this sounds pretty elementary. Frankly I suspect you can understand this. Some of the others in this thread I doubt can. Certainly even with all that I have said I would tend to agree with you that it sounds like a waste. It might even be abusive. I doubt that it is technically fraudulent. But there certainly are some interesting questions here. But the idea that this is “giving to charity” is pretty far off the ball which is the claim made several times here.
Fraud guy
Jan 06, 2007
According to the DHHS program grant requirements (HHS-2005-ACF-ORR-ZU-0007), this facility is not being used as a “staff secure” site, only as a “basic shelter” site. Security expenses should then be minimal in this case.
Native Illinois agencies, working under DCFS (Illinois Department of Children and Family Services) are able to provide shelter/group home services, as listed in the grant requirements document, for substantially less than the Heartland Alliance bid (I believe the ratio is $120/bed/night vs. $181/bed/night).
I have looked at high end homes throughout Chicago, inside and out. This facility is to hold 30 children and 6 staff (per shift). I saw a $700,000 home in Sugar Grove, 7 bedroom, 7 acres, which could also hold this facility. Maryville Academy, owned by the Archdiocese of Chicago, is a purpose built complex that once held several hundred children. It is now barely utilized (after scandals rocked the management under Father Smith), and so portions could be leased (remember, this is a 5 year program) for a likely much lower sum than the outright purchase of the Naperville property. I was in a massive home in Lake Forest, another posh community, that would have held this number of residents easily, and it was priced at $1.2 million.
The location was supposedly chosen because the local asian community would be able to provide volunteers and staff to support the work. However, per HHS the children will be mostly Chinese, and the local asian population is largely Korean. The areas with the highest Chinese populations are Chicago, Schaumberg, and Oak Brook, all far away from this location, and all nearer the major airport that will be the transport hub used to receive these children.
Basically, what I am saying is that all of the factors that have been cited as compelling this choice of site are not accurate as to the suitability of the location.
When HHS took over the program from DHS, there were ? locations managed by 33 Regional Juvenile coordinators in OJA (Office of Juvenile Affairs), which was managed by a Director and 10 staff in Washington. The budget was $31.6 million. In 2004, ORR (Office of Refugee Resettlement) had 41 locations with 920 beds available. There are currently 36 locations managed by a Director and 28 staffers at DUCS (Division of Unaccompanied Children’s Services). (I am looking for bed numbers, which are hard to find; however, a comment in the DHS OIG report from ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement), dated 9/8/2005 states that their inability to transfer children to ORR custody was mainly resulting from two factors–the cancellation of many of the contracts for juvenile facilities, and that many of those were geographically close to where the children were apprehended. This is important because other sections of the report note that ICE would have to transfer the children, and they were constrained because of a hiring freeze through at least the end of 2004 (basically they had to do more work with less staff to help another agency, which apparently was hiring at the time).
The grant noted above, above and beyond DUCS funding, is to use $42.883 million to add/replace capacity for 750 beds in their system. The Naperville facility is meant to hold 30 children, and will cost $1.87 million; the grant average is $57,177 per bed, while the Naperville facility would hit $62,333 per bed, 10% over the average (I have yet to find the cost of the Galleria and “down the street from the Bushes” locations). To contrast, a nearby group home, with similar staff/child ratio, and which actually is for more aggressive children (possibly close to the staff secure level), was bought for $200,000 several years ago, and can handle 8 children. This comes out to $25,000 per bed. These kind of numbers start my B.S. sensors screaming. Even for the reasons Ray pointed out, this home can be considered expensive for the purpose.
Regarding the charity meme: Heartland Alliance positions itself as a charitable organization. As HS has stated, if they are receiving over 75% of their money from government contracts, they are less a charity (receiving freely given funds, whatever the tax code definition) than a government contractor (a la Kellogg, Brown, and Root).
BTW, thanks to HS and Ray for helping me clarify my arguments against this waste of funds. And Ray, if your scenario above is true, would the methodology used to argue for this home/location (and a rumour that they would add high fencing and a security guard) sound like a “cover” for the placement?
Thank you,
Fraud Guy
Fishy business
Feb 19, 2007
The home in Naperville was on the market for a very long time for somewhere around 1.2 Million. It never sold. While home prices are dropping in the area, this one went up! All of a sudden this contract comes in for 1.87 Million. I want to know whos pocketing the extra cash.
Ray
Feb 19, 2007
Probably a better question than some of the other questions here. Although I will add one comment from my experience with some of these grants. The grant would probably require that “full market value” be paid for the property, and the Federal government’s way of calculating this is very weird, and appears to pretty much be designed to generate a higher than true market value value.
One issue here is that properties which are right next to each other and which generate very similar prices are weighted “much higher” than other sales, as do properties which are next to each other and are purchased by a single buyer. If a single buyer offers the same general price for several properties which are next to each other then this weighting generally is so high that all other sales don’t even really count. This means that if someone in the general area (and that can be a pretty wide area for this part of the transaction) purchases several properties at a premium in order to get a larger parcel to do something with then that will be the value applied to all properties in the area. This also means that commercial property transactions can be considered in residential valuation if the commercial area is creeping in on the residential one. That is a big business buying several businesses tearing them down and building a big facility will not effect local federal valuations. But if that same big business gets a zoning change and buys several houses to tear down for their facility then this transaction and the subsequent valuation of the commercial property will generate the only transactions which will actually truly count for the federal valuation.
As I also just hinted here; this function of properties being next to each other and selling at the same time will also cause transactions to be the primary valuation transactions on a valuation when if they were not next to each other they could not be considered. Properties which sell in a block like this which are miles away.
Fishy business
Feb 20, 2007
That’s sounds like just another way to waste money. I could understand it if the owner didn’t want to sell his property and they were forcing him to sell it. If the property was for sale anyway what is the point to paying more?