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| The Pimps of Mississippi |
(Update: A story similar to this one is coming to light today in Iowa . . . BREAKING: New audit reveals that Iowa's Republican Governor Kim Reynolds improperly funneled $450,000 of federal COVID-19 relief funds to pay the salaries of her staff members and then concealed it by routing it through DHS.)
A new report shows Birmingham's Balch & Bingham law firm has disbursed only 17 percent of funds from a pandemic-related rent-assistance program in Mississippi, according to a report at banbalch.com. Writes Publisher K.B. Forbes:
Government-made millionaires Balch & Bingham is under fire after a national investigative report in The Washington Post in September showed that the embattled law firm had reaped millions in fees from the State of Mississippi while hardly disbursing resources to tenants in need.
According to the Post, a mere 11 percent of a $186-million rental assistance fund was disbursed to those in need, while a similar program in Harrison County, Mississippi, run by housing advocates, had the opposite results: disbursement was at 89 percent.
Now new data from the U.S. Department of Treasury shows that Balch stooges in Jackson have disbursed only 17 percent of rental assistance funds as of September 30. Harrison County is now up to 91 percent.
Why is Balch's performance so dismal? Should the firm have been involved with such a program in the first place? Writes Forbes:
Called “The Pimps of Mississippi,” Balch, the evictor and collector, received millions in contractual cronyism to allegedly distribute federal rental assistance funds and to manage another federal program to prevent foreclosures, according to the Post.
Balch partners Christian B. Waddell and Lucien Smith appear to have secured the lucrative no-bid contract through what we believe is contractual cronyism.
At the end of September, the U.S. Department of Treasury had the right to recapture funds if less than 65 percent of the resources had been spent.
Balch may indeed be fighting to recapture funds and justifying what appears to be an incompetent, inefficient system to disburse to those in need. Many of the tenants in need happen to be people of color.
This unsettling story is not just about money. A major human element also is in play. But Balch does not fare well on that front, either:
During the height of the Pandemic, Balch inhumanely evicted an alleged senior citizen from a Habitat for Humanity home, violating the spirit of the public charity and federal moratoriums.
Time to dig, dig deep into Waddell, who boasts on Balch’s website of all the millions in procurements he has secured and his involvement in underwriting almost $1 billion in bonds.
Contractual cronyism was not the intent of the federal rental assistance program. Helping those in need was.
The OIG and federal investigators have not forgotten regardless of what gobbledygook Balch spits out.
7 comments:
Sounds like "The Pimps have sticky fingers.
A similar story is breaking today:
BREAKING: New audit reveals that Iowa's Republican Governor Kim Reynolds improperly funneled $450,000 of federal COVID-19 relief funds to pay the salaries of her staff members and then concealed it by routing it through DHS.
Good Lord, stealing from a COVID relief fund? That's like stealing from the Cancer Society.
I should note that it's not yet clear what has happened with the funds Balch was handling. In the Iowa case, it appears an audit has shown the money was funneled into salaries for staff members. That does sound like theft.
Interesting note: The Iowa scam came about via a state audit. Any way Mississippi would audit Balch & Bingham? If not, will the feds do it?
From USA Today:
DES MOINES, Iowa — A state audit report on government spending released Monday accused Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds of using nearly $450,000 in federal coronavirus relief funds to pay salaries for 21 staff members for three months last year and concealing the spending by passing it through the state Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.
State Auditor Rob Sand said a review of the state's payroll system shows the money was used to pay the Republican governor's office staff, but it's unclear why she had to take federal money to pay the salaries.
"What is not clear, is why these salaries were not included in the governor's budget set prior to the fiscal year and prior to the pandemic," he said in the audit report. "Based on this information, we conclude that the budget shortfall was not a result of the pandemic."
More from USA Today:
Sand said he requested information from the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management and was initially provided a spreadsheet listing the governor's employees with a section labeled FY 2020 Shortfall and the amount of $448,448.86. A subsequent version was sent to him in which the section title was amended to COVID-19 Personnel Costs with the same amount of money.
"That spreadsheet that shows they changed the headers to basically instead of say shortfall to say COVID 19 is a pretty big deal," he told The Associated Press, suggesting that the attempt by Reynolds' administration to conceal the use of the federal money was to fill a salary gap."
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