ACORN’s Albuquerque office (Photo by Peter St. Cyr)
Two weeks after hidden camera videos surfaced showing ACORN employees in Maryland giving advice on how to establish and run a brothel with underage prostitutes, an ACORN official in New Mexico says six employees have already completed the first phase of retraining and both offices in the state remain open.
However, ACORN Southwest Regional Director Matthew Henderson told NMPolitics.net that offices in Albuquerque and Las Cruces are only providing limited services to existing clients. The organization has “temporarily” suspended accepting new clients.
“We are not processing in-take applications. Instead, we’re referring people to other state agencies that we’ve worked with before that can help them,” Henderson told NMPolitics.net this afternoon. “This is temporary while we go through a national re-evaluation.”
Henderson, who also manages six ACORN offices in Arizona, Nevada and Colorado, said the organization normally provides assistance with foreclosure avoidance, citizenship application processing and even helped people prepare taxes and qualify for low-income heat and energy programs in the winter.
Last Friday, all six employees attended training to make sure proper policies and procedures are in place to avoid any improper activity. And more training is on the way.
Lots of controversy
On Tuesday, national ACORN Board Chair Maude Hurd announced that former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger would lead an independent inquiry into the organizational systems and processes surrounding the social services of the organization.
And the U.S. House of Representatives recently voted to deny all federal funds for ACORN in a GOP-led strike against the scandal-tainted community organizing group that came three days after the Senate took similar action. The Census Bureau has also severed its ties with the group for the 2010 national census.
Henderson said ACORN’s offices almost immediately became targets of hateful e-mail attacks and threatening phone calls after FOX News broadcast its special report that first revealed the videos to the public.
Today, he said the offices are still receiving e-mails from people upset with the organization, but “there has not been any actions to change security. We are simply collecting all of the hate mail that comes in, and if there’s any eminent threat we’ll notify the authorities.”
ACORN has been the subject of controversy for some time. Even before this most recent situation, at least 11 states already were investigating ACORN for alleged voter registration fraud stemming from the general election in 2008. Most of the allegations concern fraudulent forms submitted by temporary ACORN employees hired to register voters in poor and minority areas.
None of the current allegations relate to fraudulent voting.
‘Judge New Mexico ACORN based on the work we do’
On Sept. 17 Henderson described his first reaction to the FOX broadcast in a prepared statement released to reporters:
“If FOX News had wanted to focus on New Mexico ACORN’s tax preparation work, we only wish that they had brought a hidden camera at the end of tax season, when our offices were open late every night, filing free tax returns for low and moderate-income families. The truth is that ACORN helped over 700 hard-working families in New Mexico collect nearly $700,000 in tax refunds over the past two years and $90 million nationally.”
Today, Henderson said, “All that we ask is that the rest of the world judge New Mexico ACORN based on the work we do on behalf of working people here in New Mexico.”