Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History

This is “Page” not “Post” so its presence remains as a reminder of this grants stream, and how one may look them up AND then look up the grantees.  The source of funding for CFDA 93086 (Healthy Marriage Responsible Fatherhoood) remains what is classified last I looked at USASPENDING.gov as from the same appropriate funding which would pay “TANF” assistance.

Picking on Georgia for this page is somewhat arbitrary.  It is where I’ve been posting recently.  I had noticed one FBO (“Faith-based Organization,” so-called), got curious, got in somewhat “over my head” with astonishment at what goes down as in the public interest in this state, as well as in others.

See this 5/12/2016 post:  Despite Truly Funky Tax Returns, HHS Remains Loyal (2010-2015) to One Faith-Based (under Two Diff’t EIN#s, ONE of which the IRS acknowledges#) in Stone Mountain–or is it Conyers?– Georgia

Practices in these fields are similar in many states; studying individual states is always relevant to what happens in other states, although.  Studying one state with some focus will also help develop awareness of what MAY be occurring in other states, i.e., how are these 93086 being allocated and to whom, and how does that intersect with “Violence Prevention” block grants.

What’s also interesting on this search result is which organizations showed up and how very few of them, really, are still involved and on the grants stream.

Click to see TAGGS Advanced Search Results (show more detail in each record):  I also have posted the link again and table as viewed 5/13/2016 afternoon, at the bottom of this page.  The table has a sky-blue background color and 39 rows.  This page has a lot of background information on the grantees, and other information, between,  Use the PageDown and PageUp functions, but I do recommend reading through the VALUABLE information between.  I am simply reporting on how some grantees tell the public what they are doing, and what the records say there are doing.  I am also documenting the centralization of both marriage/fatherhood (93086, with associated Abstinence funding [93010, 93060) for many organizations) intersects with “Family Violence Preventions/Battered Women’s Shelters/)_____ in two categories (93592 and 93671, “…”DISCRETIONARY” and “To STATES AND INDIAN TRIBES,” respectively).

TAGGS.HHS.gov website also produces “Summary Reports by CFDA,” but only covering from 2005 forward and describes what is meant by “CFDA.”

I wonder WHY NOT from 1995 forward.  In this type of Summary Report, users may select CFDA programs and year, but not which fields (columns) display or in which order, and may not select individual states.

For comparison, 2005-now, this summary report of CFDA 93086 (Healthy Marriage) and two kinds of “Abstinence” CFDAs which some HMRF groups also tend to receive, nationwide.  This is only ballpark, and I would not rely on it for an assessment of the larger picture — as award titles relating to “promoting fatherhood” may be found in many quarters and under other categories, for example in Head Start programming, etc.

As you can see, for just about a 10-year period, HMRF funding is summarized as over $1 billion, and Community-Based Abstinence Prevention, $441M.  That program apparently was stopped (as to funding) in year 2010, but the “Competitive Abstinence” funding continues.  Here’s that chart, again, no state was specified.  Some groups set up to take HMRF grants also initially get some “Compassion Capital” (CFDA 93009) grants.

According to the Table (Report) I just ran on TAGGS.hhs.gov, using the select criteria shown in the post title, and nothing else (other than choosing which columns to display), only these organizations below in Georgia received “CFDA 93086” which is to say, “Healthy Marriage promotion/Responsible Fatherhood” grants.  According to this report also, for the ten years 1996-2005, no such grants hit the state of Georgia. (Table displays at bottom of this page):

While that’s not credible either (healthy marriage responsible fatherhood funding dates back at least 10 years earlier, to 1996), notice who is listed — ONLY these organizations, two of which, it turns out, were working with each other anyhow.  Spelling and capitalization as shown on the database:

• “ROCKDALE HOSPITAL AND HEALTH SYSTEM (now apparently owned by someone else and called something else)… “
• “Future Foundation”
• “GEORGIA STATE UNIVERSITY RESEARCH FOUNDATION” (Atlanta)
• “BETHANY CHRISTIAN SERVICES OF GEORGIA”
• “MOREHOUSE COLLEGE”
• “More Than Conquerors Inc”
• “GEORGIA UNIVERSITY” (Athens)
• “GA ST DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN RESOURCES” and
• “GWINNETT CHILDRENS SHELTER”

re:  Gwinnett Childrens Shelter, I was wondering, out of all grants seemingly appropriate for a children’s shelter or group home, why “Promoting Responsible Fatherhood” was the choice (see table below, they received a five-year grant @$250K each year, looks like), so looked that last one up and found it had a Donor Advisory from “Charity Navigator — however only for not reporting fundraising expenses in 2014, after they had previously.  Perhaps with the HHS sponsorship, they no longer need to?

Charity Navigator has become aware of the following information in connection with this charity:

Gwinnett Children’s Shelter has historically reported fundraising expenses on their Form 990. But its most recent Form 990 for fiscal year ending in June 2014 list no fundraising expenses. Based on our experience, charities only rarely are able to raise substantial sums of money without incurring any associated fundraising costs. We have reached out to Gwinnett Children’s Shelter for clarification, but we have not received an adequate explanation. We are therefore unable to evaluate Gwinnett Children’s Shelter and thus have issued this Donor Advisory.

To which their director, apparently, responded with this comment:

Maureen McGladrigan Kornowa ·

Amity Regional Senior High School

A MESSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR.

Gwinnett Children’s Shelter has completed the revised 990 in accordance with Charity Navigator’s requests.
We began a new business model in June of 2014 which included drastic cuts to the budget which was cause for concern on Charity Navigator. As good stewards of all that is entrusted to us, you can rest assured that every dollar you contribute to GCS goes to needs and programs for our children in need.
We greatly appreciate your continued support and I am available at any time with questions and am happy to provide any information you request. I can be reached at mkornowa@gwinnettchildrenshelter.org or 678 620 5756 (cell)

Like · Reply · Feb 22, 2016 7:36am

Gwinnett Children’s Shelter
3850 Tuggle Road, NE
Buford, GA 30519
tel: (678) 546-8770
fax: (678) 546-8775
EIN: 58-1662180

Mail donations to:
P.O. Box 527
Buford, GA 30515

The response here is a little mis-leading — as the organization’s tax year, it turns out, ends June 30, 2014.

Below are the last three tax returns for this organization available from “The Foundation Center”.  Note:  the “2014” top row doesn’t signify Fiscal Year 2014 (as referred to by Charity Navigator, above) but YE 2014, which is for this organization, FIscal year 2013.  Nevertheless — this is a Shelter for Homeless MOTHERS and THEIR CHILDREN — so why is it (see below) taking “Promoting Responsible Fatherhood” money?  Also, a quick glance at the reporting shown at least on 2013, other than that they are running in the negative (the HHS grants ran out in 2010?), some discrepancies internally within the tax return.  For example, the Statement of Expenses is supposed to break out Part VIIA Salaries from regular employees.  Such salaries are reported (though vastly, well, LOW, I’d think even for rural Georgia) on Part VIIA, but nothing where appropriate on Part IX.  This may affect how accurate the Summary (Part I, Page 1) is in reporting salaries….

Search Again

“ORGANIZATION PROVIDES TEMPORARY HOUSING, LIVING PROGRAMS, AND LIFE SKILLS TRAINING TO HOMESLESS CHILDREN AND THEIR MOTHERS”

HHS now generates a “tinyurl” link to its reports. The “new, improved” user interface with this database refuses to display more than 25 rows at a time — which is a disadvantage when the purpose is scanning the results for patterns, or an overall look. Certain links will be clickable, and others not, depending (I think) on how many columns are chosen, or some other factor I’m unaware of.  It is unfortunate that the grant award #s are not themselves active in this run — but it’s still helpful to see.

Curious about the “Home of Hope @ [organization name]” after having earlier seen “Center for Community Initiatives @ Georgia Family Council,” I went looking for any business entities named “Home of Hope.”  None still active, although a name was reserved for a few months in 2015 (top row), a business entity showing Joel Osteen (!!) CFO in 1998 — but dissolved in 2005 after not registering more than once — and last row, a defunct nonprofit which apparently did exist 1975-2001, all “Home of Hope” names.  GEORGIA CORPORATIONS DIVISION (search business entities link)

You should look at the “Articles of Organization” for the middle row, above — which focuses on young women who are “at risk of becoming sexually active,” targeting low-income, minority, or abused children.  Unbelievable.

Home of Hope Learning and Resource Center Inc (GA %22Olsteen%22 officers), existed 1998-2005, filed ONE annual report in 2001. See page 2 of its ARTICLES!

(I have NO idea why this displayed as a negative, i.e., white on Black, when loaded as a “JPEG.”  But look at the link above, pages 2 and 3 (Board of Directors included a Rev, representatives from the Board of Education, the Housing Authority, a “Family Connection” and some others) which are its Articles I and II (and III, saying the duration is “Perpetual” which didn’t come to pass after all — they stopped filing (!!):

A “Joel Olsteen” is one of the officers listed:

“…The objects and purpose of the Corporation are to: (a) receive and administer funds and property to be used exclusively for scientific, educational and charitable purposes, to focus on the needs of children, youth and families without regard to age, ethnicity, gender, mental physical abilities and characteristics, race and lifestyle orientation, within the meaning of Section 501©3 of the internal Revenue Code; (or corresponding provisions of any subsequent federal tax code);
[[In other words, it doesn’t want to get disqualified as a nonprofit for discrimination along those lines, including “lifestyle orientation” — but then read the next paragraph in which they are going to focus on low to very-low-income, traumatized by domestic or sexual assault women (they call them “females” but by definition these would be young women) and might (as part of their “lifestyles” actually engage in sex, including potentially sex with contraception but NOT necessarily leading to pregnancies. Nothing about helping protect them from further violations is referenced in the text.]]

(b) to assist and encourage low income, single parent FEMALES who are or have been victims of domestic violence or sexual assault, focusing on young minority FEMALES who live in low to very low income neighborhoods and are at risk of becoming sexually active;

© to teach or emphasize the importance of education, self sufficiency, independence, and abstinence as a means of overcoming the effects of living in poverty, yet increasing the opportunity to obtain productive employment; and

(d) engage in such other lawful activities and enterprises, including the formation of partnerships, joint ventures, and other business associations, as authorized by the Georgai Nonprofit Corporation Code (etc. — boilerplate text….).   ARTICLE III Duration:  “The corporation shall have perpetual duration and succession in its corporate name.  … ARTICLE VI — “The Corporation will have no members.”

(Address -registered in the name and address of the Executive Director — not revealing the governmental connections of its board members).

Does the above “Home of Hope Learning and Resource Center” defunct entity have any direct relationship with “Home of Hope @ Gwinnett Children’s Center”?  Not that we know of, BUT the latter has made it clear it associates with both businesses and churches (I found an archived website which lists over a dozen churches) and my point is, word travels fast in church circles, and terminologies with the word.  The concept “Home of Hope” came somewhere and the above mentality is probably pretty close to where it came from….

Olsteen, or even “Joel Olsteen”  may be a common name, but sill I’m curious — any relationship to the more famous Joel Olsteen Ministries??)  two brothers have a practice, if they aren’t twins, their bio blurbs say both attended the same school (Florida State) for their undergrad and for their J.D.’s in the same year.

James N. Osteen, Jr. (Jay) and C. Joel Osteen are the founding members of Osteen & Osteen. Jay Osteen was previously recognized in Super Lawyers Magazine as one of the best young lawyers in the State of Georgia and was one of only twenty lawyers selected in the area of personal injury law. Further, C. Joel Osteen was previously recognized as the best area attorney three years in a row through voting in the Liberty Loves campaign.

For comparison: Joel & Victoria Osteen, of Joel Olsteen Ministries a.k.a. Lakewood Church in Texas:

(Image is from “Getty” seen at “heavyeditorial.files.wordpress.com,” re: rumor that Joel O. (above) had endorsed Donald Trump…)

(I went looking for anywhere listing whether these above, might be his offspring.  Summary under “notable biographies.” I have run across church ministries focused primarily on coaching young, impoverished mothers before and am also curious if where the phrase “Home of Hope” originates, within the faith-based communities, most likely. I also wanted to point out that by the Olsteen’s megachurch being a ‘family-run church” (per this article) it is more exempt from certain IRS scrutinies than others might be:

http://www.notablebiographies.com/newsmakers2/2006-Le-Ra/Osteen-Joel.html (a portion of the Olsteen story….

In 2005, Osteen’s Lakewood Church moved into a new local meeting-house, the Compaq Center, which was the former home arena of the Houston Rockets. His organization negotiated a rather tough sale with municipal authorities, beating out an affluent real-estate developer determined to build on the site, and then went on to spend more than $90 million to renovate it into a 16,000-seat church.

Those funds came from the well-managed operation that Osteen oversees, in which family members and trusted cohorts play leading roles. Even Osteen’s brother, a surgeon, gave up his practice and works for Lakewood Church. Their mother, Dodie, still speaks at every Sunday service, and Osteen is nearly always seen with his wife, Victoria, by his side, a statuesque blond with similarly telegenic good looks.** The two married in 1987, two years after Osteen met her when he stopped by the jewelry store her father owned. Their two young children, Alexandra and Jonathan, also take an active role in Sunday services.

Wikipedia on Victoria Illoff shows what family he married into.  (Also, doesn’t name these two young Osteen lawyers as their offspring, which information I was looking for).  One thing they also both have in common is that neither of them graduated from college, even a bachelor’s degree (He, at Oral Roberts, she elsewhere), but her father appears to have been brilliant (see ‘NASA”)…

Osteen married Lakewood Church co-pastor Victoria Iloff on April 4, 1987. They have a son, Jonathan, and daughter, Alexandra.^{[25]  [Clicking on “Victoria Iloff” link]} 

“Victoria Osteen was born Victoria Iloff in Huntsville, Alabama. She lived near Marshall Space Flight Center where her father, Donald Iloff – a mathematician with General Electric – was a member of GE’s Saturn rocket project team led by German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun. In 1963, at the age of two, Osteen moved with her family to Houston, Texas when her father took a position with the National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA). She grew up in a southern suburb of Houston, near the Manned Spacecraft Center (now known as the Johnson Space Center).

Growing up, Osteen attended the Church of Christ, a relatively conservative Protestant church, where her mother, Georgine Iloff, taught Sunday school and her father served as a deacon. Osteen attended (though did not graduate from) the University of Houston where she studied psychology while working in her mother’s jewelry business. It was while working in the jewelry store that she met Joel Osteen in 1985 when he came in to buy a new watch battery….”

Somehow, despite the times, and the obvious academic ability of her father — she was not encouraged to complete college or engage in a profession, develop her brains along those lines, but instead work within her mother’s  jewelry business. One wonders what is meant by “jewelry business.”

Lakewood Church belongs to a growing category dubbed the megachurch—Protestant, usually evangelical or charismatic religious groups with 2,000-plus members. At 30,000 members, Osteen’s is the largest of this new breed of the American religious experience, and likely the most lucrative, too. Its annual revenues are estimated at $60 million, but concrete numbers are not readily disclosed, since it is technically a family run church. Under U.S. law, churches are tax-exempt, but still have to submit some data to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Family-run churches like Lakewood, however, are excused from such scrutiny.

Osteen lives in the posh Tanglewood section of Houston, a prosperous outcome that owes much to his former second career before he took over his father’s church, in which he bought and renovated rental properties. At Lakewood, much of his work week is spent writing and practicing his Sunday sermon, while other Lakewood ministers handle the bulk of the other pastoral duties—weddings, funerals, and other engagements.

Read more: http://www.notablebiographies.com/newsmakers2/2006-Le-Ra/Osteen-Joel.html#ixzz48fgbBbkR

Nope, looks like this Gwinnett Children’s Shelter has kept the same name and is still Active/In Compliance:

Cover page and Filing history (click Business Name link to see for J517788, the shelter, it stays active), on the Georgia Corporations Division electronic database, show:  Incorporated in 1986; “NAME CHANGE” in 1994 (no filings previous are shown), NO annual reports between 1994 and 2001.  Note, direct HHS grants began coming apparently at least by 1999.  After 2001 (not including “2002”) they seem to have been filing regularly.  That there is nothing showing between 1994 and 2001 may indicate noncompliance with filing annual required reports — or that this database hasn’t uploaded them.  It is, however, odd.

Post-HHS Grants Stream Re-Branding:

RE-BRANDING — Website “GwinnettChildrenShelter” now redirects to “GAHomeOfHope.Org” and a very colorful (large photos and print) website announcing their new rebranding as “HOME OF HOPE @ GWINNNETT CHILDREN’S SHELTER.”

I can see that — now that the HHS grants ran out as of approximately 2013 (judging by none between then and now), the shelter has “repurposed itself” to focus on exclusively women (young mothers) AND to be able to accept children as young as newborns.  As it says:

http://gahomeofhope.org/message/

Our new “Home of Hope” at The Gwinnett Children’s Shelter, was born out of necessity along with the support of many helping hands in our community and beyond.

We are a nonprofit, 501©3 Corporation and a residential care facility which provides services for homeless children from 0-17 years of age along with their young mothers.  We also provide care and services for homeless girls aging out of the foster care system at 18 years of age.  We provide customized “Life Plans” that are designed around the physical, emotional and educational needs of our kids, while helping Mom get a plan of action to get back on her feet.

Our goal is not simply to be a place of refuge, we are the “NEXT STEP” towards independence.  We take our guests from homelessness, to hopeful, to a home of their own

There is a blog — but the blog is completely undeveloped as shown by boilerplate Latin (or quasi-Latin) filler text on the page.  A message from “our Executive Director” Maureen — has a large photo and tells absolutely nothing about the person.  I can tell, however, from the 2013 tax return that her salary was undeniably low for anyone working full-time (I’m sure, even in Rural Georgia” at under $30K.  If that figure is to be believed….

From GAHomeOfHope.org, Boilerplate Blog Page, posted Feb 23,2015, not updated @ 5:14:2016, Our Life Coaches | Home of Hope

“A message from our Executive Director: The Gwinnett Children’s Shelter has been serving our kids in a loving and nurturing environment for more than 27 years. As we GROW forward and expand on our programs to best meet the needs of our children in crisis, we ask you to partner with us with your time, energy, talents and RESOURCES to make a difference in the lives of our kids and young adults who need our support. Our new program is designed to help single mothers and their children, as well as youth who “age-out” of the foster care system, achieve the necessary life skills training they NEED to successfully thrive outside our program, for the rest of their lives. Their SUCCESS is our SUCCESS! With YOUR support, we are building our future Community Leaders….their future is in our hands. We have the unique opportunity to end the cycle of homelessness TWO generations at one time. We, as a Community, have the Compassion, Power and Resources to make this happen and we ask you to join us by making your donation today! You have an open invitation to stop by so we can show you how your donation is working here in our own community. Blessings, Maureen Kornowa, Executive Director”

Logo taken from an upcoming (May 26, 2016) private professional golf fundraiser for this organization.  Do they know it was getting HHS HMRF funds which might otherwise (than as PRWORA restructured welfare) have more directly helped these young parents, apparently some of them, or THEIR parents?

The blog’s ” projects” page is solicitation only — for volunteers, for money, for fund-raising, for noncash gives, for networking to other fundraisers.  Their Donate page posts no EIN# and no Financials are posted on the website either.  Their staff are not listed.  Nothing is revealed about their board of director rs, or Executive director. “Not cool!”

Maureen  Kornowa has a LinkedIn page  It mentions 12 year prior nonprofit work, but (oddly) no work history beyond this, which only started in 2014. I see a 2011 news article with her as of  Executive Director of North Gwinnett Cooperative Ministry.  Here, she apparently balanced books and was able to stop fake ACH payments from a former client.

North Gwinnett Co-op: Client accused of theft

BUFORD — The executive director of the North Gwinnett Cooperative Ministry is pressing charges against a woman who is accused of using the charity’s bank account information to pay utility bills.

Maureen Kornowa, who runs the co-op located in Buford, said she discovered the theft two weeks ago when she was balancing April bank statements. Kornowa said a woman helped by the organization in March used the routing and account numbers from one of the co-op’s checks to make unauthorized payments over the phone to three different utility companies.

Kornowa said warrants have been issued for the arrest of Maria Martinez on charges of identity fraud and theft. She said police have searched for Martinez at two addresses, both of which have been vacant.

“We’re a last resource for families in need,” Kornowa said. “We already helped his woman pay utilities and get prescription medication. … She got (help) and then took more…

Since the NEW webpage has so little to tell about this organization, I went to the “Wayback Archive to look at older versions of the former website.

98 captures were shown between 2001 and 2016, it says:

March 20, 2016 didn’t say much more, but does list the business partners and churches they work with.  Some government entities were mentioned under “Businesses” (which is inaccurate). A much earlier (2007) site has more information about its other partnerships:

Whereas before, the purpose was not to alert the public to the physical shelter location (for safety was mentioned among  among other reasons.  However, now that they are more focused on training up young homeless mothers, (and that the federal grants stream — at least the direct one — ran out) they are going more interested in visibility.  Deliberately, the re-branding seeks to point it out to the public, to draw attention to the residence.  This was good for a local signage business, that talks about it:

 Re-branding a Shelter to Make it Home: Exterior Signage

The Gwinnett Children’s Shelter in Buford, GA provides resources to help homeless single mothers and their children, as well as youth who “age-out” of the foster care system, achieve the necessary life skills training they need to successfully thrive outside the program, for the rest of their lives.

Recently the executive director, Maureen Kornowa reached out to Pinnacle to discuss a re-branding project for the shelter.  Their current branding had the tagline “Where Hope Lives”, encouraging those who took shelter at the campus that there was hope for a brighter tomorrow.  

Maureen decided to take it one step further by branding the shelter as a Home of Hope.  Pinnacle met with Maureen to discuss the overall concept of re-branding the signage to make it warm and inspirational, but keep the some of the old brand color during the transition.

A lighted monument sign greets visitors and residents to the Home of Hope and also provides inspiration when leaving.

The Gwinnett Children’s Shelter, now known as Home of Hope, needed a complete overhaul of exterior, interior, and vehicle branding.  The new branding needed to convey the message that they wanted to portray to both the public and the residents.

In the first part of this recap, we are going to focus on the exterior signage that included directional and way-finding signage, a new monument sign, and street banners.

Entryway Signage

The entryway for Gwinnett Children’s Shelter was previously marked with a post and panel sign that identified the shelter.  In its current state, it was not easily noticed, and someone looking for the shelter could easily pass it by.

And, ….

Street Banners

The Home of Hope also requested new pole banners to welcome visitors and residents while conveying a message of hope.

The challenge with installing these new banners was that they had double-sided graphics and we had to make sure that the message read the same both coming onto the property as it did leaving the property.

For this reason, our graphic production could not be the standard double-sided banners using the same art on the front and the back of the same banner. We had to do a drive through to make sure we provided consistent motivation to everyone at Home of Hope.

As we mentioned above, this project encompassed a complete sign package that included not only the exterior signs discussed in this article.  It also included interior signage as well as a vehicle wrap.  We will discuss the details of these projects in future articles.

GENERIC INFORMATION, ABOUT THIS PAGE

The small font for this post is to help simplify the painful process of “Squishing” the table into the width of just one WordPress-sized post which won’t run over the margins. As the $$ amount is always on the right side, that simply obscures the amounts….

TAGGS (TAGGS. HHS.gov Advanced) search selecting only CFDA 93086 and the State of Georgia (specifying no year at all), and certain column (data field) headings for the report comes up with $19M in 39 awards.  It also failed to produce any result earlier than 2006, something I’ve noticed before when selecting on 93086.  I am certain that these grants existed within the state before then.  Click to see:

I just posted on “More Than Conquerors, Inc.” in Georgia, with leadership including a Viola January and a Philippia C. Faust. The result shows grants 2006-2010 to “Rockdale Hospital & Health System” [Principal Investigator, Philippia C. Faust] for HMRF, amounts roughly $455K, and further below, grants 2011-2015 (so far) to “More Than Conquerors, Inc.” [Principal Investigator Philippia C. Faust], with the largest one, as I believe I pointed out in the post, combined and $1.8M. In addition, it was also getting, separately, Competitive Abstinence Funding and Teen Pregnancy Prevention, etc.

The ROCKDALE HOSPITAL & HEALTH SYSTEM + MORE THAN CONQUERORS, INC. SYMBIOTIC RELATIONSHIP

The name “Rockdale Hospital & Health System” may explain why I couldn’t find “Rockdale Medical Center” as described on the groups’ History page” at first:  More than conquerors, Inc. about us/history page

I’ve copied a large section of the very fine, light-gray, print on the page showing self-description of the many sources of revenue (federal — more than one kind, state, and apparently county) they have been processing and with whom.  Again, it appears to me that an unmentioned connection with the Georgia Family Council’s (which is a Focus on the Family-affiliated group, although not formally, the background can easily be traced through what is now called CitizenLink/Family Policy Alliance which formerly was a “related organization (tax-exempt) of “Focus on the Family.”  I just posted some of this information yesterday (5/12/2016):

I also notice at one point in the rhetoric, MTCIGA seems to call itself a ministry — although it also in the context was talking about collaborating with another ministry.  In fact, what this business entity is — seems to be a Georgia corporation and 501©3 that has problems filling out its tax returns, but no problems attracting federal funding!

There is a very nice photo of some youth around a man whose face I might recognize if I were from Georgia — but I’m not, and I don’t.  Anything I say about this organization is not a reflection on any youth who may have become involved with it.  They’re the target clientele justifying the programming.

. . .Between 1998 and 1999, MTCI managed and delivered programs for local governments and agencies. These included awards from The Status of Health, DeKalb’s Neighborhood prevention project that addressed nutrition in pregnant adolescent with an emphasis on abstinence. Each goal and objective outlined in the prevention project was successfully meet. The financial management and accountability for fund disbursements met the standard established by the funding agency. Periodic reviews were conducted to address regulatory and liability concerns.

In 2003, under the fiscal leadership of Rockdale Medical Center, we receive a one-half million dollars three-year federal grant which afforded expansion into the classrooms for entire semesters system- wide in Rockdale County, and added group homes. During that thee-year period, A-HELP reached greater than 5,500 (unduplicated count) students providing them more than 25,000 exposures to abstinence. Additionally, greater than 3,000 subset populations in the community were encountered through mock weddings, abstinence training’s and community events.

In 2004, MTCI received a federal capacity grant which afforded the organization the opportunity to build infrastructure such as organizational development and financial skills. After the completion of that grant, MTCI continued to build the necessary capacity to meet all of the responsibilities inherent in being a fiscal agent.

MTCI and Rockdale Medical Center enjoyed several years of a mutually beneficial relationship, as MTCI provided the management of community-based projects that provided Rockdale with an excellent opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to meeting a wide range of needs that go beyond medical treatment for the local population. During the course of this relationship, Rockdale acted as the banker for the projects, accepting all grant finds and dispersing them in accordance with the requests made by MTCI. MTCI provided all of the other supervision, management and direct services for the federally funded grant projects that were offered as a result of this partnership.To prepare for additional grant management responsibilities, the organization forged a relationship with a CPA, established a banking account, as well as accounting and funds management procedures.

In 2006, we also expanded our service delivery by collaborating with ATLAS Ministry, Inc. located in rural Greene County Georgia. We served approximately 300 middle and high school students each semester with our HOPE (Healthy Options for Personal Empowerment) program.

In October 2010, with the collaborative efforts of Morris Brown College and Atlanta Public Schools, MTCI received its first independent funding, whereby the ministry is both the fiscal agent and program provider. This effort will serve [sic] at least 1900 youth in Fulton County over five years.

This appears to be saying that before 2010, MTCI didn’t function independently, or receive grants directly. This also appears to call itself a “ministry.” Above, the reference to Rockdale implies that this was needed in order to receive grants. Yet, “MTCIGA” per the tax returns, claims to have been formed as far back as 1989. How could a nonprofit corporation date back to 1989 and not be prepared to receive grants independently until, literally, about 21 years later?? Many parts of this narrative simply do not make sense…

 

In October 2011, MTCI was awarded their second healthy marriage funding opportunity to serve 6,600 youth and young people in five Georgia counties over three years. In October 2012, MTCI was awarded State funding by the Governor’s Office for Children and Families to provide abstinence education for 300 students in Rockdale County over three years. In October 2013, MTCI was awarded a federal abstinence education funding to serve 1,200 youth and young people in five Georgia counties over two years. In October 2014, MTCI was awarded a second federal abstinence education funding to serve 700 middle school students in Rockdale County, Georgia over two years. In 2015, MTCI was awarded State funding by the Department Human Resources to continue abstinence education, while also again being awarded a healthy marriage and relationship grant that will include research for impact of our endeavor. We are looking forward to many more years of community service for the advancement of positive youth development throughout Georgia as we assist adolescents in navigating the “success sequence” and ascend towards becoming productive in every area of their lives. View all of our current programs HERE.

My recent post has some more information on who or what appears to be the business identity of what MTCIGA called “Rockdale Medical Center” in Conyers, Georgia.  Obviously on this page I spent more time on a smaller grantee — Gwinnett Children’s Shelter.  However, to confirm that this hospital appears NOT to be a local corporation — in fact it’s a Foreign registration (LLC) since 2008, with street address in Tennessee, but a legal domicile of Delaware, a state known to protect privacy of corporations really well, and a favorite of many groups I end up looking at on this blog:

I searched only the words “Rockdale Hospital” on Georgia Business Division site, and came up with one filing only.  You may click on organization name to access more details and note that it did indeed only register in 2008:

With all that I trust you might understand why I was very interested to see this search result on TAGGS — healthy marriage/responsible fatherhood grants only, as described in the post title.   HHS generates the Selected qualities, the Report total, and the Award count (in red, next few lines) after which is the report — as “squishable” by abbreviation or hyphenation to fit these margins.

Click to see on the HHS site.  Note: this isn’t a saved search, but saved search specs.  If more 93086 HMRF grants are added to Georgia meanwhile, they will be included in the results, and the total will be different (higher — or lower.  Sometimes there are negative entries in the Awards column)….

[Run date:  5/13/2016]

CFDAs:  93086

States:  GA 

Report Total:  $19,422,058

Distinct Award Count:  39

Note: I abbreviated some terms, including “Hosp.” for ‘Hospital” and “Dept.” for DEPARTMENT, in the Recipient column, and obviously some in the Award Title column as well.  I marked with different background color two separate grantees representing, per its history page above, “More Than Conquerors Inc.” in Georgia under the care of Ms. Phillippia C. / Phillipia Faust.

….Question — why is a Children’s Shelter getting Responsible Fatherhood grants?  Click on the shelter to see that the amount exceeds their “basic center grant.”  Why?

GWINNETT CHILDRENs SHELTER HHS Grants (1999-2013) include about $1M HMRF, $2.7M Total.