Ford Foundation Investigation

It's not quite the investigation that's needed, but it's a start. The $11 billion Ford Foundation, one of the Big Bad Eight ultra-liberal, politically correct US foundations, is being investigated by Michigan's attorney general, Mike Cox.

Cox is looking into why the huge foundation gives so little to Michigan, where it's incorporated, and why its expenses are grossly out of line with other foundations.

I wish he'd look into board corruption, and Ford's support of radical fringe issues, socialistic policies, and anti-Americanism. One of Ford's biggest recipients is the Tides Foundation, which funds environmental activist groups like Earth First!, Greenpeace and Institute for Social Ecology, which condone (and may conduct) property destruction and other terroristic acts.

As for the foundation's international agenda, it carries out its foreign policy of liberal, even anti-American activities from offices in many hotspots of Islamist and Socialist/Communist politics: Hanoi, Beijing, Nairobi, Lagos, Cairo, Moscow.

Another big recipient of Ford Foundation bucks are consumer advocates who routinely attack successful capitalist corporations like Ford. Once necessary, these groups have become attack dogs, litigating more for the sake of anti-corporatism and anti-capitalism than to defend consumers. Recipients include Consumers Union, Consumers Federalion and Public Citizen. They split $11.5 million in Ford grants in the last decade.

Activist Cash is my source for this data.

Daniel Howes broke the story of Cox's investigation in the Detroit News:

"Even if Henry and Edsel never spent a dime [in Detroit] when they ran the Ford Foundation, this is the third-largest philanthropy in the United States and it is incorporated here," Cox said. "And we have an obligation to make sure they aren't plundering, that they aren't engaged in limitless self-dealing without parameters, and that's what we're looking at."

Pointing to data he's accumulated, he wants to know why the foundation employs as many as it does, why its employee costs are more than double its closest rival among America's top 10 foundations, why its occupancy costs dwarf others.

He could add questions about potential conflicts of interest among the foundation's board of trustees and grants their foundation has approved.

The foundation, which calls itself a "public trust," says its board delegates grant approval authority "to the president and other staff and then reviews the approved actions."

Interesting question: The foundation's grant database says the foundation has awarded grants totaling $1.84 million to the Council of Foundations over the past three years. Berresford sits on the Council of Foundations' board.

Foundation board Chairwoman Kathryn Fuller was CEO of the World Wildlife Fund for 16 years until she stepped down in January 2005. Between 2003 and 2005, the foundation awarded grants totaling $830,000 to the World Wildlife Fund.

Foundation trustee Richard Moe is president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In 2003, the foundation awarded two grants totaling $300,000 to the preservation trust.

This is a limited investigation of just one of the big US foundations that foment global dissent (in addition to the good work they do, which is undeniable). It is a very, very small start into a sea change that has to occur among these behemoth charities.

hat-tip: memeorandum
Tags: Ford, Ford Foundation, Charity, Earth First, Consumer activists, Greenpeace, Institute for Social Ecology, Mike Cox