Way back in , the Nevada Legislature passed a law greatly expanding the regulation of fundraising beyond traditional tax-exempt charities. The enumerated causes included law enforcement, fire fighting, public safety, public health, patriotism, and anything else that sounds like a charitable mission. Alsoβand cruciallyβfor the first time, the SOSO was given broad authority to issue cease-and-desist orders and issue civil financial penalties, which would also draw public attention to any culprits.
A huge number of these outfits were what I call faux charities others call them scam charities. Instead, they spend almost all the money raised in fundraising expense and hidden fees for their operators, generating terrible financial efficiencies.
Donors get rooked. These telemarketers, who employ computer-generated voices using soundboard technology, operate nationally, but they seem to find fertile ground in Nevada. There undoubtedly have been tens of thousands of such calls over the years to my fellow Nevadans.
On its face, the measure put Nevada in the vanguard of consumer protection on this issue. The agency repeatedly blew a number of statutory deadlines and rules for responding to my request. Finally, the SOSO last week admitted to me in writing just how many civil penalties the agency assessed under the law through December 31, , a time period covering the heyday of faux charity calling.
The SOSO also finally admitted to me how many cease-and-desist letters the agency issued to errant fundraisers under the law through December 31, How does a governmental agency admit this kind of failure? Why, by anonymously speaking the language of Classic Bureaucracy, which I learned about long ago in law school.
