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Orange County Supervisors Katrina Foley and Vicente Sarmiento are calling on state and federal officials to investigate two nonprofits that were given millions of taxpayer dollars and haven’t answered questions on where they spent it.
The Viet America Society and Hand to Hand Relief Organization, the two nonprofits in question, have been facing questions from county leaders for months on where they spent bailout funds that were supposed to be spent on feeding the elderly during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In total, the Viet America Society has received over $10 million from the county.
In a joint Wednesday statement, Foley and Sarmiento said they want local, state and federal officials “to investigate the use of any state and federal funds allocated to VAS and H2H.”
“In light of the obvious delay tactics, clear obstruction, and dismissive response from counsel for VAS and H2H, we have no confidence that these organizations will ever produce proof of lawful expenditures or voluntarily return taxpayer funds,” Foley and Sarmiento said.
The two supervisors are also demanding the return of over $4 million.
They’re also calling on Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer to start an investigation.
Additionally, Foley called on the county’s internal auditor to review every contract the county entered into under the American Rescue Plan Act, a federal fund that fueled most of the pandemic response efforts in Orange County.
“Our duty as county supervisors is to serve as the watchdog for public funds and protect our tax dollars from abuse,” Foley said.
While county lawyers have asked for more details on how they spent it, they haven’t been asked to return that entire amount yet.
So far, neither nonprofit has been able to prove where they spent the money.
Viet America Society hired auditors to prove to the county they spent the money properly, but told county officials they were finalizing a report showing that auditors couldn’t find where the money was because there was no paper trail.
They were fired the next day.
Sterling Scott Winchell, the group’s attorney at the time, told county leaders the nonprofit had no intention of returning the money.
He stopped working for the Viet America Society on Tuesday, and it’s unclear if the group has a new attorney.
Officials from the nonprofits couldn’t be reached for comment on Wednesday.
Right now, Viet America and Hand to Hand Relief Organization both face a deadline of Aug. 26 to explain where the money went or give it back, with top county counsel Leon Page threatening legal action if they don’t.
The supervisors’ demands come on the heels of Cypress City Councilwoman Frances Marquez, who’s currently running for a seat on the board of supervisors, who demanded on Tuesday the county get the money back and figure out how all those dollars were spent.
“Orange County residents are experiencing a crisis of trust,” Marquez said in a statement. “It is unfathomable that Viet America Society cannot account for the taxpayer dollars directed by Supervisor Andrew Do nor is it acceptable that the County can’t answer simple questions about the funding’s origins.”
She also asked supervisors to create an ethics commission to investigate the issue, along with creating an office of contract compliance to vet nonprofits and businesses trying to do work with the county to ensure this doesn’t happen again.
The problem first came to light when an LAist investigation highlighted the connection between the Viet America Society and Supervisor Andrew Do, who’s daughter used to be employed by the nonprofit when they received the funds.
While some of the nonprofit’s funds came from Do’s discretionary funds, a bulk of their contracts were approved by the county government and reviewed by multiple departments before they were issued according to records reviewed by Voice of OC.
Do did not respond for comment on Wednesday.
If the state auditor does launch an investigation, it would mark another audit of questionable tax spending throughout Orange County.
State auditors are currently reviewing a controversial settlement agreement in Huntington Beach that guaranteed at least $5 million and millions more in benefits to the operators of the Pacific Airshow.
[Read: State Auditors to Investigate Huntington Beach’s Pacific Airshow Settlement ]
And they released a scathing audit earlier this year detailing how public tourism dollars given to the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce through the city’s tourism bureau – Visit Anaheim – were used to lobby dozens of elected officials.
Noah Biesiada is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at nbiesiada@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @NBiesiada.
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