In The Red Alert - Southern Poverty Law Center

This one hits different.

In this episode of Philanthropy N The Black, we break down the recent federal indictment involving the Southern Poverty Law Center—NOT from a political lens, not from a media lens—but from a nonprofit perspective.

🔥 IN THE RED ALERT 🚨 is a monthly segment that calls out:

•  Weak leadership 
•  Performative fundraising 
•  Financial mismanagement 
•  Mission drift 

No fluff. No filters. Just real talk.

This isn’t about tearing down an organization.
 This is about protecting the integrity of the nonprofit sector.

Because when nonprofits lose trust…

•  Communities pay the price.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:18

If you know what that seems from your room, listen, we're about to get into this sudden poverty loss then. Please come have a sleep in front of the congregation. Let's talk about it. Let's do it. This is your whole Sunday shell. We're about to get into the Southern Poverty Law Center indictment. Let's do it. So let me tell you guys something. Was heavy. It was heavy, it was heavy. It was heavy. Listen, it's deep on three levels for me. And two of them I'm not qualified to speak on. So one, on a on a business level of tomfoolery, we've got while I have an undergrad and business admin, I am no business person. I am no CEO. I am none of those things in corporate America. That's one. Number two, there's a government level of BS. And while I vote righteously, I am no policy expert. And there are a lot of politics involved with this situation. Number three, the most important, and this is where I lean all the way in, right? With 30 plus years in the nonprofit sector and a master's in nonprofit administration, I feel absolutely qualified to speak about this through this platform, Philanthropy and the Black. So today we're going to strip away the noise, the politics, the distractions, all that internet chaos. And we're going to look through only one lens, and that is the nonprofit sector lens about this situation. We're going to go in depth briefly about this because here on Philanthropy and the Black, as always, we work to help keep nonprofits financially in the black, socially in the black, and morally in the black. And today, it's going to be heavy on the morally. But unfortunately, this is an in the red alert. This is an in the red alert. While the name of this podcast is in the black, there's a level of our sector that sometimes fell short. Fall short. And in those ways, when I say that, what I mean is these are nonprofits sometimes who, you know, it's not about gossip. This is about the idea of accountability. That's what the in the red sector is all about. The segment of in the red is all about. We spotlight organizations that are falling short when it comes to weak leadership, disengaged boards, performative fundraising with no real impact, financial mismanagement, hint, hint, and lack of transparency, hint, hint. Missions that sound good, but don't deliver because when nonprofits operate in the red folks, communities pay the price. So we're going to get into the context of this situation with the Southern Poverty Law Center. And let's be real, I'll be honestly with honest with you. This one hurts. This one hurts because the Southern Poverty Law Center has done meaningful historic work all over the South. But especially here in my home state of Louisiana, I'm talking about places like Homer, Louisiana, Jefferson Parish, and in New Orleans. They have been boots on the ground in those court systems and court cases doing the work. I can never take that away from them. We can't. Yes, they've had issues with leadership over the last few years with the co-founder and then the uh the last CEO stepped down for various reasons. You go look it up. We're not here to gossip. Well, maybe a little bit. But this organization has a powerful fundraising machine, folks. It has all the bells and whistles and all the things. They've been in the game a long time. They have a strong national reputation. Even though, you know, you get into the politics of the right and the left and all that madness. But at the end of the day, when you heard that name, when you hear that name, you know exactly what it's for. They have an endowment from what I read of a $730 plus million dollars with a n, not a B. But that's not small, folks. That's institutional power. Their mission is about fighting hate, seeking justice, advancing civil rights. So when allegations hit an organization and hit an organization like this, it's not just operational, it's existential. It absolutely is. The charges, now let's get into it. The charges, it's an indictment, right? Not a conviction. But the charges being discussed in this indictment, which I read, and again, I I'm no lawyer, but I read through you have wire fraud, false statements, conspiracy to commit money laundering. And when those words get attached to a nonprofit, that's not just legal risk, that's trust destruction. Absolutely, for not just that organization, but the sector. We take hits when our co our partners and our brothers and sisters in philanthropy uh go into the red, as this segment is called. It hurts all of us, right? So just to be clear, I went to the website, you know, to see the donate button, see what the definition of what they were saying they were donating to. I didn't see any particularly restricted specific funds you could donate or opportunities, but ideally all of the money helps in their mission. And so let's call it unrestricted or an operating fund. That's where this thing gets a little heavy, okay? So what nonprofits do with operating funds, which is unrestricted, meaning a donor doesn't didn't say, here's my million dollars. I want you to buy tennis shoes for young children age 10 in Tennessee. That's restricted. That means that's all you can use that money for. But these donors, donors donated to is the mission and ideals of what the Southern Poverty Law Center stands for. So unrestricted dollars have no strings attached, right? Nonprofits can usually use that kind of money to uh pay salaries, rent, programs, infrastructure, things of that nature. It is very helpful to nonprofits. I want to be clear on that. It is a beautiful thing when you're able to have unrestricted support to do those things and build out your mission and scale up and making sure you make real impact. And yes, sometimes things show up when it comes to unrestricted as other expenses, right? Let's break that this down clearly. Unrestricted money equals no strings attached. Nonprofits can legally use it for operations, staff, admin, general expenses. Even things vaguely labeled vaguely like other expenses or as needed. But here's the catch. Just because you can does not mean you should without transparency. Oh Lord, that's a word. Just because you can doesn't mean you should without transparency. And here it is, here it is. From the donor's perspective, let's be how donors normally think when it comes to this uh type of giving unrestricted. I'm giving to fight racism, all right? Power to the people, all right. I'm supporting justice, I'm funding impact. They're not thinking, I hope this ends up in a vague expense category or in the pocket of nefarious groups. Uh that's not what they're thinking. They're thinking what you said on your website, what you say in your annual report, the program, they think they're thinking you're doing that. So I'm going to support that. But when that when there's a lack of clarity, donors feel misled. And even if it is technically legal, the donor feels misled. And a lot of um organizations have a donor bill of rights. Uh I might drop that in the link so you guys can see what that was. From the nonprofit perspective, let's be clear about this. Dismantling worse racism is not always clean, measurable, or linear. It looks like advocacy, legal strategy, community organizing, police work, which doesn't always fit neatly into programs versus admin boxes. Absolutely. When you're finding something as well ingrained in our society as racism, you can't just, you know, there's ways you you say that, but it it is not clean, it's not measurable because it's racism. I mean, will it ever be rooted out, right? So here's what went wrong alignment. If your spending, reporting, and messaging don't clearly connect to your mission, you create perception risk. And in nonprofits, as in life really, perception is reality. That's the hard truth. Perception is reality. So, in this instance, according to this indictment, snitches weren't getting stitches, snitches were getting the riches. Where they do that at. So, here on Philanthropy in the Black, even though this is an in-the-red edition, because again, the in-the-red edition is about when we fail as a sector, here's some things that can be done for those nonprofits teetering or unaware or unsure. Let's get to it. Here's some answers to what not to do, right? But here's what you should do, I should say. Clearly define expense categories. Clearly, avoid vague languages like other without breakdown. Align every dollar back to mission. This is important too. Over-communicate with donors all the time. Here's the money, here's what the money did. Lastly, ensure board oversight is active, not passive. And we're gonna get into board breakdown and boards and board makeup and what they should be doing in another uh episode later. Don't do this as a nonprofit, don't hide behind technical legality. Like the gray. Don't be in the gray. It's a bad place to be on all the levels, right? Don't assume donors won't notice. Listen, some of your most um generous donors, they're they're what I like to call professional philanthropists. They're not ignorant, they're not dumb, but they completely know how this thing works. They're they're donating for personal reasons, for community reasons. They are intelligent, highly capable donors. So please don't assume that they won't notice. Another thing, treat unrestricted, don't treat unrestricted funds like free money. It's not. Okay? Your mission says one thing. You're showing me how you're you're going to illustrate and give me them examples of how you're doing the work with my money. Great. It's not free money to just go take trips with, to buy cars, and so on and so forth, right? Or pay, you know, never mind. Because again, just because it's allowed doesn't make it right. That's heavy. That's really heavy. Here it is. In closing, this episode isn't about tearing down an organization, it's about protecting a sector. Because when organizations with massive resources, national influence, deep donor trust get it wrong, it doesn't just hurt them, it hurts all of us. We're a family, and when one gets it wrong, y'all, we all got it wrong. That's big facts. In the red alert is just where we don't just call out problems. We in this, when you see this right here, do it again. When you see this, oh you see me in this red, that means it's an in-the-red alert. We break down problems and we rebuild better. That's what we do. Because at the end of the day, if nonprofits don't stay in the black, financially, socially, morally, our communities will go in the red. And we cannot afford that to happen. This is Selly Cell. This has been Philanthropy in the Black, the In the Red Alert edition. Go to the website, philanthropyandtheblack.com. Check us out on Spotify, Amazon, Apple, wherever you get your podcast. Like, subscribe, share, support the mission, and uh, we'll do this again in another time.