Your Tax Dollars at Work

The government seems to waste a lot of money. I decided to take a look at how some organizations that receive government money use it, and in some ways cheat to get it.

Three years ago I decided to volunteer for a non profit organization call domestic Violence and Sexual assault Services (DVSAS). This organization deals specifically with domestic violence (DV) and victims of sexual assault. After three months of training I was put on the DV desk. My job was pretty simple. I took phone calls and helped clients who had been abused by their partners.

Being that DVSAS is a non profit group, they get their money from donations and corporate grants. However, most of their funds come from our tax dollars. The government dolls out money based on the amount of "clients" that walk in or call the office. Now I have no problem with this, but many of the people who call or not actually calling for DV or sexual assault.

I would estimate that over 70% of calls are just people asking simple questions (i.e. phone # for sheriff's department or for info on other agencies services). The problem is that DVSAS counts ALL of these calls as clients. So if you called them and inquired about a service that you probably won't ever use, you will be counted as a client.

So DVSAS is taking a lot of money from the government to support "clients" that don't even use their services. I did much of the filing during my two years I was there and can tell you that many people called once and were never heard from again.

Now don't get me wrong, I am all for helping people in need. But to have a non profit agency counting every single call as a "client" is robbery. They are taking money away from the government that another agency, or even the government, may need. I think that is a form of robbery, but that is just me.