I think like anything else, that Charities can be infiltrated and bad things happen. Particularly if the office you are dealing with is a large city, but certainly individuals in rural areas can succumb to temptations too.
The best thing to do IMO, is to either volunteer to be on a local board where you can track the finances, or to give money to a local group where you know the people on the board and those doing the work.
In addition, for anyone interested, you can go to guidestar.org and see the most recent 3 years of IRS 990 forms that almost all charities are required to file annually.
In addition, you may request a copy of a charities financials, and they must provide them. In person requests are due in 24 hrs. Written requests are due in 30 days. IIRC, you may be charged a per page cost.
I do still help ring the bell for my local Salvation Army. Largely due to the help it gave my Dad when he arrived back in N.York after WWII. With little money, no food, no shelter, and no way to get home.
They took care of him and bought him a bus ticket home. We are allowed to give checks that restrict the Salvation Army donations to use in our county. I do this because our county is one of the poorest in the State. The surrounding counties are much better off.
Salvation Army, no kill shelters and my high school nuns retirement are my charities.
Thanks.
It’s hard for me to pass a SA bell ringer without dropping something in the bucket. I have read the statements about where they spend the money and it has always looked good to me. (I’m not an accountant, so just on the surface.) But they have a much different “feel” to them than some of the other “slick” charities.
When all this is over, I think we’ll find out who the good guys and bad guys really are. I predict SA is good. But as you say, bad people can infiltrate. In fact, I have a theory that bad people seek out the good in order to corrupt it and do their evil.