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Circle of Friends for American Veterans (COFAV) (also known as "American Homeless Veterans") was a
501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...
organization that supported veterans and related causes. It was founded in 1993 in
Falls Church, Virginia Falls Church is an independent city (United States), independent city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 14,658. Falls Church is included in the Wash ...
, by Brian Arthur Hampton. The charity is criticized for spending about 10% of their income for charitable causes, with the remainder being paid to fundraisers. COFAV contracts with professional fundraisers who use paid telemarketers to solicit funds. This structure costs COFAV over half of every dollar donated. Of the remaining funds, a relatively high percentage is executive salary and deferred compensation. Charity watchdogs have compared COFAV unfavorably to its peers. In 2020, COFAV was dissolved and Hampton was fined $100,000 by the attorney general of Virginia.


Charitable activities


Lobbying

Hampton said he had "hosted more than 100 members of Congress across 196 veterans shelter-themed forums in 46 cities" in rallies for these non-profits. In the summer of 2015 Lauren Baghsarian, from Stockton University's Washington Center program served as the Circle of Friends for American Veterans' Program Coordinator where she "research dthe many issues our country's veterans face while reintegrating into civilian life." hemet with Legislative Assistants of Congress and Senate.


Direct financing to veterans

"Over the years" COFAV "has written modest checks for over 30 transitional facilities" for veterans who are "drug-free, alcohol-free, well-groomed and willing to work".COFAV Mission
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Political action

By 2015, Hampton had established a sponsoring a veterans-focused political action committee Put Vets First PAC DBA Association for American Veterans and hired Outreach Calling to do the fundraising. According to the
Federal Election Commission The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency of the United States whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Cam ...
(FEC), by 2018, the PAC had contributed $2000 in 2015 and $2000 in 2016. From January to September 2017, no PACs or politicians had received any funds from Hampton. However, Outreach Calling had raised $1.5 million for the PAC, keeping $1.3 million. Hampton paid himself $75,000 from the PAC.


Related entities

The founder of COFAV, Brian A. Hampton, founded the Center for American Homeless Veterans, also known as the "Association for Homeless and Disabled Veterans", another
501(c)(4) A 501(c) organization is a nonprofit organization in the Law of the United States#Federal law, federal law of the United States according to Internal Revenue Code (26 U.S.C. § 501(c)) and is one of over 29 types of nonprofit organizations exe ...
charity operating from the same address. He founded Put Vets First, a PAC, also operating from the same address. In 2007 Hampton began contracting with the professional fundraiser Outreach Calling. Hampton publishes the ''Veterans' Vision''. COFAV and its related entities contracted with several professional fundraising organizations, including Outreach Calling, of Bloomfield, New Jersey and Charitable Resource Foundation, Inc. of Greenwood, Indiana.


Outreach Calling

Outreach Calling Inc is a for-profit fundraiser which was incorporated in 2009. It is headquartered in New Jersey with offices in Canada and the United States including a virtual office in Reno, Nevada. The firm's telemarketers solicit funds on behalf of not-for-profit charities. According to New York state regulators, "a wealthy 49-year-old New Jersey businessman", Mark Gelvan (b.1978), is the "driving force behind Outreach Calling." Outreach Calling collects money for "
homeless veterans Homeless veterans are persons who have served in the armed forces who are homeless or living without access to secure and appropriate accommodation. Background Many of these veterans suffer from post traumatic stress disorder, an anxiety disorde ...
," "breast cancer survivors", "disabled police officers", and "children with leukemia", among others. According to a 2017 CPI analysis, "Outreach Calling, raised more than $118 million on behalf of about two dozen charities from 2011 to 2015", retaining $106 million. This left c. 10.3 percent or $12.2 million, for the non-profit charities and those they serve - homeless veterans, breast cancer survivors, disabled police officers, and children with leukemia. In the United States, it is legal for-profit telemarketers to keep 90% of the donations they solicit as long as they to not "mislead prospective donors" or "lie to them about how their contributions will be used", according to Jim Sheehan, "head of the charities bureau for the office of
New York Attorney General The attorney general of New York is the chief legal officer of the U.S. state of New York and head of the Department of Law of the state government. The office has been in existence in some form since 1626, under the Dutch colonial government of ...
Eric T. Schneiderman." In 2012 they raised $21,332,659. Of that $2,227,761 was retained by the charities. In 2012, "Outreach Calling collected $6,681 on behalf of the Disabled Police and Sheriffs Foundation from Massachusetts residents ... and turned over $668 to the charity, according to state records." Their standard contract gives Outreach Calling up to 90% of donations. In July 2017 the Saint Louis,
Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...
Better Business Bureau Better Business Bureau (BBB) is a private, 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization founded in 1912. BBB's self-described mission is to focus on advancing marketplace trust, consisting of 97 independently incorporated local BBB organizations in the Unit ...
(BBB) published a caution to consumers in their decision to donate to Hampton's Center. BBB reported that only 10% of all donations collected by the Center for American Homeless Veterans' two main fundraisers actually go to the Center for American Homeless Veterans.


Badge Charity

Charity watchdogs say COFAV falls into a category called ''badge charities'', which claim to be raising money for police, firefighters and veterans, but the money goes mostly to the fundraisers, not the charities. Badge charities are described in a 2014 article in which telemarketing company Civic Development Group (CDG) was ordered to pay "$18.8 million, the largest penalty ever handed down in a consumer protection case" by the
Federal Trade Commission The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction ov ...
(FTC), COFAV, Paralyzed Veterans Association, and Disabled Veterans Association were listed on the F rated charities for which CDG fundraised.


CharityWatch

In 2016,
CharityWatch CharityWatch, formerly known as the American Institute of Philanthropy (AIP), is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in Chicago, created in the United States by Daniel Borochoff in 1992, to provide information about charities' financial efficiency ...
gave COFAV an F assessment on a scale of A+ to F as it did not meet transparency or governance standards, for example the COFAC had fewer than five voting members. As well, for the fiscal year ending on September 30, 2015, only 11% of their calculated total expenses (c. $1,600,000) were spent on programs with 89% spent on overhead. During the same period, of the c. $1,500,000 of calculated total contributions it cost $89 in fundraising, to raise $100 in contributions.


Saint Louis Better Business Bureau (BBB)

In July 2017 the Saint Louis,
Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...
Better Business Bureau Better Business Bureau (BBB) is a private, 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization founded in 1912. BBB's self-described mission is to focus on advancing marketplace trust, consisting of 97 independently incorporated local BBB organizations in the Unit ...
(BBB) published a caution to consumers in their decision to donate to Hampton's Center. BBB reported that only 10% of all donations collected by the Center for American Homeless Veterans' two main fundraisers actually go to the Center for American Homeless Veterans. Furthermore, the BBB reported that over a two-year period from 2014 to 2016 the two major fundraisers used by the center,
Reno, Nevada Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada-California border, about north from Lake Tahoe, known as "The Biggest Little City in the World". Known for its casino and tourism industry, Reno is the ...
-based
Outreach Calling Circle of Friends for American Veterans (COFAV) (also known as "American Homeless Veterans") was a 501(c)(3) organization that supported veterans and related causes. It was founded in 1993 in Falls Church, Virginia, by Brian Arthur Hampton. The cha ...
and
Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ; nv, Hoozdo; es, Fénix or , yuf-x-wal, Banyà:nyuwá) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities and towns in Arizona#List of cities and towns, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona, with 1 ...
-based
Midwest Publishing The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...
, had collected almost $USD 5 million. Of that amount approximately $508,000 was retained by the Center for American Homeless Veterans and almost all of that was used to "pay salaries, legal fees and office-related expenses."


Center for Public Integrity

In December 2017,
Center for Public Integrity The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) is an American nonprofit investigative journalism organization whose stated mission is "to reveal abuses of power, corruption and dereliction of duty by powerful public and private institutions in order to c ...
(CPI) journalist Sarah Kleiner published a report on Brian Arthur Hampton and his non-profit organizations including the Circle of Friends for American Veterans. Kleiner revealed that according to the 2015 Center for American Homeless Veterans’ tax returns, "it provided just $200 in grants to other organizations out of $2.5 million in overall expenditures, the vast majority of which paid telemarketers." According to an October 24, 2018 article co-published by CPI,
NBC News NBC News is the news division of the American broadcast television network NBC. The division operates under NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, a division of NBCUniversal, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Comcast. The news division's var ...
,
Public Radio International Public Radio International (PRI) was an American public radio organization. Headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, PRI provided programming to over 850 public radio stations in the United States. PRI was one of the main providers of programm ...
(PRI) and the ''
Buffalo News ''The Buffalo News'' is the daily newspaper of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls metropolitan area, located in downtown Buffalo, New York. It recently sold its headquarters to Uniland Development Corp. It was for decades the only paper fully owned by W ...
'', a former Circle of Friends staffer, turned whistleblower, asked the "IRS to revoke not-for-profit status of the Circle of Friends for American Veterans and the Center for American Homeless Veterans" because "his former employer is bilking donors out of millions of dollars — money intended to help homeless veterans". In their October 4, 2018 response, the IRS noted that this could "take several years until final resolution of all tax matters." As of October 24, 2018, based on filings submitted by Put Vets First! PAC to the
Federal Election Commission The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency of the United States whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Cam ...
Hampton "continues to raise significant sums of money." The October 24 article co-published by the CPI,
NBC News NBC News is the news division of the American broadcast television network NBC. The division operates under NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, a division of NBCUniversal, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Comcast. The news division's var ...
,
Public Radio International Public Radio International (PRI) was an American public radio organization. Headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, PRI provided programming to over 850 public radio stations in the United States. PRI was one of the main providers of programm ...
(PRI) and the ''
Buffalo News ''The Buffalo News'' is the daily newspaper of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls metropolitan area, located in downtown Buffalo, New York. It recently sold its headquarters to Uniland Development Corp. It was for decades the only paper fully owned by W ...
'' said that, according to federal records, "Hampton spends almost all of the money on fundraising, wages for himself and others and overhead costs".


Charity Navigator

By January 2018,
Charity Navigator Charity Navigator is a charity assessment organization that evaluates hundreds of thousands of charitable organizations based in the United States, operating as a free 501(c)(3) organization. It provides insights into a nonprofit’s financial s ...
, the "New Jersey-based philanthropy advocacy group placed 'concern advisories' on the Circle of Friends for American Veterans and the Center for American Homeless Veterans. "Charity Navigator holds that reputable charities should spend at least 75 percent of expenses on programs."


See also

*
Charity fraud Charity fraud is the act of using deception to get money from people who believe they are making donations to a Charitable organization, charity. Often a person or a group of people will make material representations that they are a charity or part ...


References

{{reflist, 30em Charities based in New Jersey Organizations established in 2001