Since we are closely following the controversy in Wyoming (see our previous post), let’s have a look at who exactly has expressed an interest in being the federal government contractor wishing to do business and resettle clients in Wyoming—Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains (LFSRM) sometimes known as Lutheran Family Services Colorado. (Why they need to operate under two names is beyond me!).
![](https://service.thrivent.com/content/includes/fraternal/images/Jim-Barclay.jpg)
Let’s not tip our hand prematurely!
We first became aware of their role when it was learned that officials there were unhappy to be prematurely mentioned in publicity surrounding Wyoming Governor Mead’s proposed plan. They wanted the plans for Wyoming to be kept secret from the general public until they were further along.
“The largest refugee resettlement agency in the Rocky Mountain region.” they have “offices located in Denver, Colorado Springs, Fort Collins, Greeley/Evans and Fort Morgan, CO and Albuquerque, NM, and services provided in Wyoming, Montana and Western Nebraska.”
Although they do other work for children and families, they had time to resettle a whopping 1,567 refugees in FY12-13. Learn more here.
LFSRM is a subcontractor of the much larger Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS) headquartered in Baltimore, MD. Just the other day we noted that LIRS has taken down its reference to an office in Casper, WY:
Note that in this post we wrote in July, LIRS linked a Casper, Wyoming office (Gillette and Casper are two cities mentioned as possible resettlement sites). However, if you go to LIRS website today the link has been erased. Have they given up? Or, are they just laying low until the political storm blows over?
Could they possibly have already been bringing in those Somalis we wrote about here?
Funded almost entirely with taxpayer dollars!
Lutheran Family Services RM is not a privately-funded church group, it is a quasi-government agency which is 84% funded by tax dollars.
Let’s visit their most recently available Form 990 here.
Their gross revenue was $12,915,054
$10,812,318 comes from government contracts.
Although they don’t list grants they do list government contracts on page 9 (they took the word “government” out in this Form 990, but I checked previous ones to be sure in which they did categorize the majority of their income as from “government contracts.”). LOL! I think these so-called ‘non-profits’ are increasingly sensitive and don’t want you to know how much they depend on tax dollars. This is a business not a charity!
When you visit that previous Form 990, check out the big jump Barclay’s salary took in just two years from 2010-2012!
CEO James Barclay makes a cool $199,330 in salary and benefits and 4 other top executives are in the 6-figure category including James Horan who runs their refugee branch. (page 8). Barclay made $172,267 two years earlier.
Then here are some of their expenses (rounded numbers). Without your cash they could not exist!
Nearly $5 million in salary, benefits and employment expenses were paid out.
Occupancy and other office expenses approached $900,000.
$259,000 went for travel expenses (what for just the Rocky Mountain region?).
$55,000 was spent for conferences.
And, they even spent $32,000 lobbying (for what? more money from government?).
More on page 10.
In order to keep the government gravy train chugging along they have to bring in more and more refugees and likely they are running out of places for them in Colorado, thus their venture in Wyoming!
Every one of you concerned about refugee overload for your community must research who will benefit from more immigrants in your town or city because it is sad to say — this is all about money! (and about changing the demographic makeup of your town).
Several years ago we followed the controversy (mostly in Colorado) about Somalis working at meatpacking plants and demanding special prayer times in the workplace. Our entire category, entitled ‘Greeley/Swift Somali Controversy‘ should be useful for readers here. I didn’t realize, at the time (or I don’t think I did), what the role of Lutheran Family Services Colorado was in all of this—they likely were the source of all the Somali workers for meat packing companies. Adding insult to injury, Swift is a Brazilian owned company!