‘Firefighter’ Charity That Raised $4.2M, Gave $5.6K to Shutter

WYANDOTTE, MI — Firefighter Support Services of Wyandotte, which claimed to raise money for firefighters and fire victims but spent 90 percent of the money elsewhere, will shut down in the next 60 days under a settlement, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette said Thursday in a statement.

As part of the settlement, the directors of the charity will also pay $144,000 over the next three years and agree never to work as directors or officers of a charity.

Three-fourths of the settlement will go to the Southeast Michigan Chapter of the American Red Cross fire relief fund, and the remaining will go to pay for the cost of the investigation.

Schuette’s office filed notice in May that it intended to shut down the charity for deceptive and misleading fundraising practices. The charity and its Southfield-based fundraiser, Associated Community Services, raised $4.2 million from donors, but never made any of the promised grants of any substance to families who had been burned out of their homes.

• ‘Firefighter’ Charity Raised $4.2M, Gave $5.6K: State

Only about $5,585 — or one-tenth of 1 percent of the $4.2 million — went to fire victims, The remaining money went to fundraising costs, salaries and administrative costs, or to programs that were not disclosed in Firefighters Support Services’ solicitations.

Firefighters Support Services used a blanket donation program to exaggerate the extent of its charitable programs and its efficacy as a charity, Schuette said, achieving this by obtaining donated blankets that were purchased by Congress for a program intended to combat homelessness.

Firefighters Support Services then included inflated values for the blankets on its public financial statements, he said.

“Michigan residents are very generous, but the unfortunate reality is that we all must be cautious of those that would exploit that generosity,” Schuette said in the statement. “The directors and officers of charities have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their organization’s solicitations are truthful.”

Schuette again reminded donors that some telemarketers, such as Associated Community Services in the present case, keep 85 percent or more of each donation. He encouraged donors to research their own charities and give directly to them.

More information about professional fundraising costs is found in the attorney general’s 2015 Professional Fundraising Charitable Solicitation Report.

Image via Shutterstock