Learning from non-profit scandals (even as they go out with a whimper)

As a Consultant and Director of Finance and Administration for World Pulse Voices, a non-profit media and training platform for empowering women, I've always held my work with non-profits dear and operated with strict integrity around financial management and transparency in non-profits.  I am a firm believer that non-profits should operate as highly principled stewards of public investment.  We rely on public trust to move our missions forward and in turn owe the public clear, transparent demonstration, through outcomes and financial reporting, that their funds are used to fulfill that mission to the best of our ability.

With this mindset, I continue to be surprised at how little fall out, a year later, has come of the Greg Mortenson scandal.  In April of 2011, 60 Minutes aired a scathing report alleging that funds from the non-profit he had founded, Central Asia Institute (CAI), had been used to fund his public appearances and to promote his book, Three Cups of Tea, to his benefit, that CAI had not actual built all the schools they claimed to have built in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and that aspects of his book were fabricated (http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-18560_162-20054397.html).  In April this year, Mortenson agreed to repay $1 million to CAI after a lengthy investigation by the Montana Attorney General's Office.  CAI issues a response to the GOA's report and to the settlement, stating learning from mistakes made during a period of growth and disputing some of the conclusions found in the report (http://www.ikat.org/ag/).  After the initial furor after the 60 Minutes reportage, little, as far as I can tell, has been made of the scandal.   Perhaps I shouldn't be so surprised, with the short attention span of our media and media consuming public, as well as the obsession with celebrity, that impacts the non-profit sector as  well.  While Greg Mortenson may no longer be the rock star of the non-profit sector, it seems so much more can be said around appropriate use of non-profit funds, donor education and validating the impact of a non-profit in delivering on its mission.

Admittedly the lack of furor does afford some relief for the non-profit sector, as there was not a large scale reactive backlash in donor giving or in trust of the non-profit sector in general.  But it does concern me that the public does not seem any better equipped to be savvier donors or that more non-profits are not more prepared to maintain their finances to the utmost integrity and transparency.