The good deeds of athletes and other celebrities — as well as the bad ones — are often publicized in the media (click here, for example). Through the sales of his Newman’s Own food products, the late actor Paul Newman was responsible for raising more than $320 million that was distributed to a wide variety of charities.
Unfortunately, according to an ESPN Outline the Lines story, many athlete/celebrity charities are not fulfilling their stated missions:
“An investigation of 115 charities founded by high-profile, top-earning male and female athletes has found that most of their charities don’t measure up to what charity experts would say is an efficient, effective use of money. Using guidelines set by nonprofit watchdogs Charity Navigator, the Better Business Bureau, and the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, OTL found that 74 percent of the nonprofits fell short of one or more acceptable nonprofit operating standards. The standards cover all sorts of aspects, such as how much money a nonprofit actually spends on charitable work as opposed to administrative expenses and whether there are enough board members overseeing the organization.”
“Some specific examples of what OTL found after conducting interviews and examining documents: NBA forward Lamar Odom’s charity that promised money for cancer research has not given a dime in grant money to any cancer entity in its eight-year history. Phone numbers listed for NFL receiver Randy Moss’ charities ring to a private residence in the Canadian province of Manitoba. New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez’s two foundations stopped filing tax returns about five years ago, leaving almost $300,000 from a fundraiser unaccounted for.”
Click the image to read more from ESPN.
