Lutherans announce departure of CEO Hartke amid claims of financial irregularities, poor management

02/14/2018 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Linda Hartke is the second refugee contracting agency CEO in a matter of months to step down apparently involuntarily from the leadership of one of nine federal refugee contractors.***

She follows Lavinia Limon (USCRI) who was, we heard from sources, “pushed out” last October (see here). No explanation was ever given about Limon’s departure, but it came at about the same time that investigations into LIRS had commenced.
This is what Michael Patrick Leahy is reporting at Breitbart this morning:

Linda Hartke is out as CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, three months after Breitbart News first reported on an internal investigation into claims of financial irregularities and harassment at the embattled non-profit under her leadership.

“Today, Linda Hartke, President and CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS), announced her departure from LIRS after eight years of service,” LIRS said in a memorandum sent to its donors, Lutheran congregations, and the U.S. government on Tuesday.

lirs-leadership-acadmey (1) — Hartke and LIRS brought refugees to lobby Congress last June for more refugees and more funding. On our dime? https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2017/06/26/refugee-contractors-brought-refugee-lobbyists-to-washington-again-last-week/

A source familiar with the operations with LIRS tells Breitbart News that the Board of Directors fired Hartke on Thursday of last week, a consequence of the findings of the internal investigation into her tenure as CEO.

[….]

“The issues related to Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIaRS) are widespread but are rooted in the main areas of financial mismanagement and the incompetence of leadership,” a source familiar with the operations of the refugee resettlement industry told Breitbart News in November, adding that “seven key areas” were the focus of the internal investigation:

Financial Mismanagement

Failure to Address Financial Irregularities Discovered by Independent Audits

Wasteful Spending

Concealment of Taxable Income

Timesheet Fraud

Budget Grant Fraud

Large Severance and Settlement Payouts to Avoid Public and Board Reporting

The State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) has contracted with LIRS and eight other voluntary agencies (VOLAGs) to resettle refugees admitted into the United States under the Refugee Admissions Program. Over the past several decades, federal payments to these VOLAGs have averaged about $1 billion annually.

Virtually all of LIRS’s revenues come from the federal government.

Continue reading here and see LIRS leadership efforts to make her departure sound so warm and fuzzy.
Yes, LIRS is a federally funded resettlement agency that I have followed for years sucking down on average 95% and up of its funding from you, the US taxpayers (see my most recent accounting, here). We sure hope that in addition to the Dept. of Health and Human Services looking into its grants management that the US State Department is doing the same! And, where the h*** is Congress?

Not such a happy place to work!

Just yesterday, I came across the Glassdoor and got a few screenshots of comments from employees that let you know what an internal mess was going on there in recent months.
Here are just three of those. (When you read these, consider that all this was going on while you paid for it including Hartke’s over $300,000 annual income/related income package.)

Screenshot (1273) — Yikes! Unkindest cut of all—likening her to Trump!

LIRS near you? Then this is what you must do….

Be sure to go here and see LIRS’s subcontractors working in 23 states. See if you have an affiliate near you. It is up to you to make sure your people know about the turmoil at the top of this food chain! LIRS headquarters is where your local agency gets most of their funds. And, it is LIRS headquarters that works with the US State Department to choose which refugees are to be placed in your towns and cities.

*** These are the nine federal contractors paid by you to place refugees in to hundreds of towns and cities via their subcontractors (see directory of offices).
They sit down with the Dept. of State every week in Washington to divvy-up the incoming refugees to be distributed (unbeknownst to you) to your towns. Although, due to the Trump slowdown, there are fewer to divvy-up each week.
The number in parenthesis is the percentage of their income paid by you (the taxpayer) to place those refugees and get them signed up for their services (aka welfare)! From most recent accounting, here.

Hartke: Lutherans want DACA amnesty, shutdown unacceptable

01/22/2018 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Today I saw this Press Release (below) on the twitter page for Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, but can’t find it elsewhere.
Apparently their site has been down for days (strange!).
Since it is LIRS’s embattled CEO making the statement I guess she survived the internal turmoil and shake up that Breitbart reported here in November.
This is what you see when you attempt to get to the website:

LIRS website — This made me laugh. Their website has been down for at least 3 days, but they don’t want to miss a donation or a travel loan payment from their refugee clients (your money but they get a cut of it when they can get refugees to pay-up!)

Now here (below) is LIRS’ Press release.

Linda hartke 2 — Hartke: ‘Non-profit’ groups like ours are impacted because we are 97% funded by the government. (She didn’t admit the 97% part!)

A point I don’t make often enough is that the federal refugee contractors support illegal immigrants with as much vigor as they support legal refugees.

You may hear your politicians make a distinction between LEGAL and ILLEGAL immigration with a comment like this:
“Legal immigration is good, but illegal is what I object to.”
But, get it into your head that the Leftwing Open Borders advocates, including those leading the nine federally funded resettlement agencies, make NO SUCH DISTINCTION. They are advocates for any and all immigrants and are supportive of amnesty as you can see in this statement.
I never understood that because each illegal (made legal) through amnesty is a competitor of the refugees (LIRS’s clients) for whom they are contracted to find employment.
The shutdown also means that money that might have been coming to them from Washington today and tomorrow is not coming.

LIRS shutdown page 1
LIRS shutdown page 2
Go here for my complete archive on LIRS. Readers of the Lutheran faith who disagree with this NGO operating in your name should speak up.

Per (refugee) head payment to contractors took huge jump during Obama's tenure

01/03/2018 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I’m sure readers get sick of hearing me talk about the per head payment the US State Department pays the so-called VOLAGs (aka resettlement agencies, aka contractors)*** to place refugees into your towns and cities, but it is important because that is why you hear the contractors wailing now about the Trump Administration’s refugee slowdown.

LIRS welcome cover — Why is the “welcome” the responsibility of the beleaguered US taxpayer?

Of course these agencies are on the Leftwing of the political spectrum and want to see diversity (and Democrat voters) planted in your towns. They have bought into the UN’s borderless world agenda, and some (maybe more than we know) work directly with global corporations to supply refugee labor, but because they can’t survive without government funding, they are hysterical now.
Thanks to collegue Jim, here is a document from ten years ago, produced by Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (the one experiencing financial accounting questions) claiming that the $850 per head payment they received at the time (half went to the refugees and half was for overhead) was not sufficient and they wanted a per head raise to $1,500.

Public-Private partnership, my foot!

They actually made the claim repeatedly in their report that the PUBLIC-PRIVATE partnership was too heavily skewed in the direction of private funding responsibility and that the feds weren’t putting up their share.
That claim led me to a Form 990 for 2009 (I couldn’t find 2008) to see if they were indeed putting in more money than the feds. The answer is NO!
In fact only 3% of their revenue from gifts, grants and loan collection fees was private funding. The remainder was GOVERNMENT funding of some sort.
Here is a screenshot of that portion of their Form 990 for 2009:

Screenshot (124) — Obviously government grants are taxpayer dollars as is the loan service fees.

That fact, that 97% of LIRS income that year was supplied by the US taxpayer, completely nullifies the argument they make in their 2008 18-page analysis: The Real Cost of Welcome where they say they are supplying the greater amount in the public-private partnership.
The purpose of the study was to ‘encourage’ an even larger share of the burden for the taxpayer.

Screenshot (125) — In 2008 they complained that $850 per refugee was inadequate and that they were putting in an unfair share of the public-private arrangement.

I thought you might like to see what ‘services’ they provide for refugees (that you pay for). Remember that they only take care of the refugees they place for 90 days.

Much of this could be done with volunteer help and donations. Isn’t this after all supposed to be a charitable humanitarian endeavor?

When did it happen that religious good works were to be paid for by the government?

Screenshot (126) — You can readily see why a refugee designation is the most desirable LEGAL immigration category one could want. American taxpayers give out a lot of goodies, plus the refugees get caseworkers to hold their hands through the welfare bureaucracy!

Conclusion: We want $1,500 per head!

Screenshot (128)_LI

I can report that they got their wish and more! The present rate (climbed steadily over the Obama years) is now $2,125!

$1,125 is to be spent on the refugee and the contractor pockets $1000 for ‘administrative’ expenses. (And the contractor decides how to spend the refugee’s share!).
And, let me be clear, this (State Department payment) is not the only money the contractors receive from the US Treasury, they receive literally millions more through other agencies and grants/contracts particularly from the Office of Refugee Resettlement in HHS.
***These are the nine federal contractors who pass money through to hundreds of subcontractors operating around the country.
Broken record alert!
It is my contention that the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program will never be reformed until these Leftwing community organizers are removed from the federal dole. You get the list twice today (earlier post here)!

The Tent Foundation hires Lutheran refugee contractor to write refugee hiring guide

11/18/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Hamdi Ulukaya, the founder of Chobani Yogurt (we mentioned their expansion in Twin Falls, Idaho, here recently), created a personal foundation launched at Davos (Switzerland) in 2016 he called The Tent Foundation.

clinton and Chobani — I’m using this photo because I’m intrigued by the fact that last night on two different Fox News programs focusing on Clinton’s past indiscretions, they used a clip from this event with Ulukaya. Why? Sending some sort of message to viewers? Or, just coincidence because it was a quick and easy video to find? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgjqzO63XfM

To learn more about Ulukaya’s pitch to global corporations see his 2016 opinion piece published at CNN Money (watch the video!) where he says he has hired 600 refugees for his yogurt plants in New York and Idaho and that he has pledged to give half of his $1.4 billion personal wealth to refugee causes.

Now comes news that The Tent Foundation has hired Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service to pen a guide for their “member” companies (affiliated with Tent) to answer questions corporations have about hiring refugee labor.

Let me be clear:

We applaud global corporations (like those below) and uber-wealthy CEOs that send millions of their own dollars to care for refugees living in camps and in other difficult situations around the world.

However, when they rely on the federal taxpayer, through the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program, to deliver their potential workers to the US (to compete with Americans for jobs), it becomes our business.

For new readers, Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS) is one of nine federal contractors*** hired and funded (on a per refugee-head basis) by the US State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement in HHS to place refugees in towns where citizens have no say in the matter and are generally kept in the dark about the process and plans for their communities.

LIRS, approximately 96% funded by taxpayer dollars, is at the moment in a tight spot due to internal turmoil.

We have also recently reported on two other LIRS side ‘deals’ with global corporations— the meatpackers JBS Swift and Tyson Foods.

Now we hear that Ulukaya’s personal foundation, The Tent Foundation, has hired LIRS to write “a 15-page resource toolkit for employers laying out why they should hire refugees.”

According to a signed contract seen by RRW, the finished product was to be delivered to The Tent Foundation by the end of October.

It is unclear if that happened, or if it did, if the ‘guide’ will be available to the public.

Making a deal…..

Here, below, is a July e-mail provided by someone close to the arrangement from an obviously very pleased Linda Hartke, LIRS CEO, to staff members (recipient names removed by me).

From: Linda Hartke
Sent: Monday, July 24, 2017 3:05 PM
To:
Cc:
Subject: RE: Recruitment of a contractor

For those who are not aware of the background on this project, the focus is the development of a 15 page resource toolkit for employers laying out why they should hire refugees, what are the legal and cultural issues to consider, how to go about it, and where to get help. The Tent Foundation is the foundation of the founder of Chobani yogurt who is himself a refugee and employs many refugees. They have many large corporate “members” related to the foundation, and their members have been hungry for such a resource.

While current LIRS staff will manage this project, the heavy lift of the research and writing will be done by a contractor as described below.

There is no formal contract or paperwork on the grant yet – but there is email communication confirming agreement on terms. We have asked them to proceed this week to finalize the necessary paperwork and begin the process to transfer funds. We did not provide a budget, but rather a fixed amount to produce the toolkit.

Congrats all, on this new funder for LIRS!
Linda
—
Linda Hartke
President and CEO | LHartke@lirs.org | 410-230-2762

Here (and below) are those companies and NGOs affiliated with Ulukaya’s foundation which wikipedia refers to as his “personal foundation.” You will surely recognize many global corporations on the list! Don’t miss Soros Fund Management!

Screenshot (1091)

Screenshot (1092)

Screenshot (1093)

Screenshot (1094)

Screenshot (1095)

And, here are the non-profit’s working with The Tent Foundation including our old pals at ‘Welcoming America.‘

Click here for our complete archive on the community organizers at Welcoming America.

Screenshot (1096)

*** These are the nine federal resettlement contractors paid largely with your tax dollars to place refugees in hundreds of locations around the US.

Go here to see a recent accounting of their finances and CEO salaries:

Major refugee resettlement agency in meltdown?

11/12/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Sure sounds like it!

We reported here that we had heard rumblings, but Breitbart News yesterday has all the gory details from a reliable source close to the organization—Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service—headquartered in Baltimore, MD.

Read the bombshell story by Michael Patrick Leahy here.

‘Source: Claims of Financial Mismanagement, Fraud, and Harassment at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service Spark External Investigation’

Hartke and Bishop on Hill in March (2) — LIRS CEO Linda Hartke (left) with ELCA Bishop Eaton lobbying on the Hill for more refugees (aka paying clients) in March of this year.

My questions include:

~Will Trump’s federal government suspend LIRS (96% funded by taxpayer dollars) until the truth is learned?

~Will Congress have the energy and the guts to take a look at this?

~And, could this be the tip of the iceberg—is LIRS a one-off or could others of the nine federal contractors have gotten loosey-goosey with their finances too?

After all when you are ‘doing good’ who would have the audacity to question how you handle free federal money, right?

~And, here is another: If proven true, what impact do these allegations have on LIRS subcontractors (aka affiliates)?

Just to remind longtime readers and for new readers arriving here today, there are nine organizations (supposedly non-profits)*** almost completely funded with US taxpayer dollars which distribute federal money to hundreds of subcontractors working in towns and cities across America where refugees are being placed.

Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service is the parent organization to the offices listed below. So whatever happens in Baltimore could have a direct impact on these local “affiliates.”

For example, LSS-MN does not act independently of the Baltimore ‘mothership’ when it comes to resettling refugees. It is the Baltimore office that sends them cases and the money that comes along with the refugees. Federal taxpayer dollars simply flow through LIRS headquarters to these subcontractors. (At the heart of the allegations about federal grant funds is the issue of how much headquarters keeps of the millions of dollars it passes through.)

LIRS affiliates could see an impact if the allegations of financial wrong doing are significant enough for the federal agency (HHS in this case) to issue a ‘stop work order.’

Arkansas
Canopy of Northwest Arkansas, Fayetteville

Arizona
Refugee Focus, Phoenix, Tuscon

California
Interfaith Refugee and Immigration Service, Los Angeles

Colorado
Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains, Denver, Colorado Springs, Greeley

Florida
Lutheran Social Services of Northeast Florida, Jacksonville
Lutheran Services Florida, Miami, Orlando, Tampa

Georgia
Lutheran Services of Georgia, Atlanta, Savannah

Illinois
RefugeeOne, Chicago

Maryland
Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area, Hyattsville

Massachusetts
Ascentria Community Services, Westfield, Worcester

Michigan
Samaritas, Ann Arbor, Battle Creek, Grand Rapids, Troy

Minnesota
Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota, Minneapolis, St. Cloud

Nebraska
Lutheran Family Services of Nebraska, Omaha

New Hampshire
Ascentria Community Services, Concord

New Mexico
Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains, Albuquerque, Santa Fe

New York
Mohawk Valley Resource Center for Refugees, Utica

North Carolina
Lutheran Services Carolinas, Raleigh

North Dakota
Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota—Center for New Americans, Bismarck, Fargo, Grand Forks

Oregon
Lutheran Community Services Northwest, Portland

Pennsylvania
Bethany Christian Services, Allentown, Lancaster, Philadelphia

South Carolina
Lutheran Services Carolinas, Columbia, Charleston

South Dakota
Lutheran Social Services of South Dakota, Sioux Falls

Texas
Refugee Services of Texas, Dallas, Fort Worth, Amarillo, Houston

Virginia
Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area, Falls Church

Washington
Lutheran Community Services Northwest, Tacoma, Vancouver

Wisconsin
Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan, Madison, Milwaukee

When you read Breitbart’s investigative piece you might not have much concern for the internal personnel machinations/squabbles/bullying/firings/ etc, but like me, you might find anything that suggests the misuse of your tax dollars compelling. Pistachio nuts! (you will have to read Leahy’s piece to see what that means!)

Here is one bit of the detailed report from a source to Breitbart (source refers to LIRS as LIaRS):

Over the six year period from 2011 through 2016, LIaRS revenue from the U.S. government grew from $30 million to almost $65 million. During that time, under CEO Hartke’s oversight, the headquarter’s spending exploded from $8.8 million to $13.5 million with a staff of less than 100. Hartke’s salary also jumped from $182,270 to more than $293,000 last year (note this does not include her 9 percemt employer retirement plan contribution, 100% employer paid health care, and paid time off).

Given that USG revenue accounts for almost 95 cents of every LIaRS dollar, the only way Hartke could continue to spend on herself and the headquarters is through charging the USG an indirect cost recovery rate on the entire amount of their grants, even though 90 percent of the funds were simply passed through to subawards to the dozens of independent affiliates that actually do the refugee resettlement work (i.e. Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains, RefugeeOne of Chicago, Mohawk Valley Resource Center for Refugees, etc.).

This is direct contradiction to the Code of Federal Regulations which only allows the ICR to be charged on the first $25,000 of each subaward. LIaRS charges it on all the money, thereby giving them millions of dollars per year to fund their headquarters for doing nothing. As an example, in 2016 of the $54 million in government funds received by LIaRS, more than $55 million was sent out in subawards to the independent affiliates to do the actual resettlement work … but LIaRS managed to charge the government the ICR rate of over 10 percent on that $55 million which brings over $5 million to be kept in Baltimore for Hartke and her office.

If I may be so bold as to tell the Inspector General at Health and Human Services what to do….

….it would be prudent for the IG to issue a Stop Work Order.

If the allegations of inflating direct costs are true and the commensurate lack of internal controls are found, LIRS financial practices raise serious questions about their ability to function as a federal resettlement agency (receiving millions of dollars appropriated by Congress!) at least until this mess is cleared up.

So what can you do?

Wilmot Collins — Note that the new refugee mayor of Helena, Montana is on this board. Ask him what he thinks about the allegations! http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/11/08/liberian_refugee_wilmot_collins_elected_mayor_of_helena_montana.html

Tell Donald Trump to suspend LIRS while the investigation continues.

And….

After reading the Breitbart expose’ you know that LIRS Board of Directors has launched an internal investigation in addition to whatever the federal government is doing.

See the Board members here and below. If you are of the Lutheran faith you need to have a word with anyone of them you know plus speak up to your local pastors!

From LIRS website:

Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service’s board of directors sets the organization’s mission goals and ensures that we have the resources, leadership and oversight necessary to carry them out. Our president and leadership team guides the day-to-day operations of the organization as we work toward achieving our mission goals with integrity, courage and fiscal responsibility.

Board Members
The board is composed of 15 members who have knowledge of and commitment to refugees and immigrants. LIRS believes strength is found in diversity and that refugees and immigrants need a voice at the table of influence. All branches of the Lutheran Church as well as other denominations are represented on the board. There are also three former refugees or first generation immigrants on the board. The LIRS president is an ex-officio member of the board.

Executive Committee

Board Chair — The Rev. Michael Rinehart, The Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast Synod, ELCA, Houston, TX
Vice Chair — Mrs. Linda Stoterau, Orange, CA
Board Treasurer— Mr. William Swanson, Pembroke, MA
Board Secretary— Mr. Evan Moilan, CFRE International, Austin, TX
Executive Member at Large — Ms. Judith Benke, Oakland Gardens, NY

At-Large Members

Mrs. Faith Ashton — Chapel Hill, NC
Mr. Wilmot Collins — Montana Department of Health and Human Services, Helena, MT
The Rev. J. Bart Day — Office of National Mission, Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, St. Louis, MO
Ms. Lori Fedyk — Lutheran Life Communities, Arlington Heights, IL
Mr. Ted Goins — Lutheran Services Carolinas, Salisbury, NC
Mr. Orville Johnson — Johnson Kellogg Properties, LLC, Stillwater, MN
Ms. Esther López — United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Washington, DC
Ms. Evelyn Soto — Associate Executive Director at Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Ms. Selena Sujoldzic — Feldmann Nagel, LLC, Denver, CO

See my complete archive on LIRS here.

***These are the nine federal contractors receiving millions of tax payer dollars annually. Could any of the others not be following federal grant reporting rules? Come on Congress, time to get serious about reviewing the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program and how the contractors are spending our money!

Tag: Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service