ACORN: What is going on here?

There has been a lot in the news over the past year concerning ACORN also known as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. On the surface this community organization is mainly concerned with helping people in impoverished communities keep or buy homes, keep families together, and generally survive in a changing economic conditions.

Current CEO Bertha Lewis is under attack by various groups for the recent videotaping of ACORN front staff helping two people posing as a pimp and a prostitute to find suitable housing and to carry on their "business." Those staff members who violated the rule and intent of ACORN have been fired, according to Bertha Lewis.

Bertha Lewis came into ACORN with the idea, as she stated on recent news programs, of making sure ACORN abided by all the laws and regulations the organization is under. ACORN does receive about 10% of its budget from the Federal government and smaller amounts from various state governments. Much of the funding is prom private individuals and companies, however.

With the recent revelations of alleged misuse of ACORN's influence in the video tapes, there has been a call for ACORN to open its books and allow Congress to investigate the group. Bertha Lewis was on FOX News Sunday with Chris Wallace, and seemed to evade the question of whether or not she would voluntarily submit to such an investigation. Her reluctance to agree to these questions may in part be in response to FOX News reporting about ACORN, which seems to be very negative, focusing only upon the recent videotaping of ACORN employees helping the two people posing as pimp and prostitute.

While this is damning enough for concern, the actual dilemma here is whether or not ACORN has in place sufficient firewalls to prevent Federal funding from being used for political purposes, to which Ms. Lewis said there were, but failed to elaborate further.

The presence of Republican Congressman Darrell Issa during the interview also seemed to put Ms. Lewis in a defensive mood.  That plus FOX News has, to my point of view, failed to report in such detail on Conservative groups that also may have violated the law.  Perhaps this scenario set up a hostile environment for Ms. Lewis from the start. 

On the ACORN site Bertha Lewis says that ACORN has reacted accordingly to the issues raised by the videotapes. ( see: http://www.acorn.org/) Furthermore she claims that the purpose of ACORN has not changed, to provide assistance to people in need of keeping or finding suitable housing, plus other community assistance for poor people.

While these goals are indeed worthy of respect, the recent revelations about ACORN have raised a lot of eyebrows as to how this organization does its work. It has also created a few lighter moments, such as when governors Bobby Jindal and Tim Pawlenty demanded that their states, Louisiana and Minnesota, stop funding ACORN, even though neither state currently funds the organization.

But will Congress create an investigation of ACORN, and if they do, will they be able to at last reveal the way ACORN works? Although I would support any group that helps poor people to survive, I also wonder, just what ACORN is doing with taxpayer funding? It is an issue which bothers me because I do not see the transparency I would expect from such a group.

Bertha Lewis said on FOX Sunday that today, Monday, 9-21-2009, she would announce which independent group would be named to investigate internal workings of ACORN. Originally she said last Friday 9-18-2009, would enlighten us about this matter, but for some reason she did not mention, that decision was delayed until today. As of yet I have not seen the update on their website.

Representative Issa seemed to push for Price, Waterhouse Cooper, without stating exactly why, or whether this group, if it found ACORN not culpable of the charges against it, would suffice to stop the criticism, and Ms. Lewis seemed to reject the idea as she appeared to ignore the presence of Rep. Issa. All in all it was a most uncomfortable interview to watch, from my point of view.

Because ACORN is not a not-for-profit organization, and because this allows ACORN to participate openly in political campaigns, I would like very much to see a full and completely independent review of the internal workings, firewalls and other measures that either are or need to be put into effect to shelter taxpayer funding from political events and spending. This is at the heart of the ACORN controversy in my mind. ACORN has, as is its right, supported candidates, including Barack Obama, and claims that no government funding has been used for this purpose, yet the way ACORN has gone about this seems murky, at best.

Only a full, independent and credible review will clear ACORN from controversy, and if there is nothing to hide, why not go through it and relieve our concerns? I would hope that in light of CEO Bertha Lewis' statements that she is working to make sure ACORN stays above the law, that this investigation and independent internal review will take place as quickly as possible.