The Salvation Army owns real estate valued at $4-billion nationwide, much of it used to provide rent-free housing to its officers, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The property represents about a third of the charity’s assets. Its holdings include 87 homes and condominiums in Southern California’s Los Angeles and Orange counties, some in affluent areas such as Santa Monica and Rancho Palos Verdes.
Salvation Army leaders say amassing property makes good business sense because it allows the organization to pay low salaries and easily transfer officers, who in the United States move about every four years. But some charity analysts say housing officers in million-dollar homes contradicts the image of sacrifice and service the group markets to donors.
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0 Responses to Salvation Army Real-Estate Holdings Valued at $4-Billion
mbir8058 - March 15, 2010 at 2:44 pm
It has been my honor and pleasure to be personally acquainted with the fine work of The Salvation Army for over 30 years. Their Officers are “called to serve The Lord” and do so with great dignity and purpose. The homes they buy are nice but not extravagant. They should be commended not criticized for their selfless efforts to provide, Soup, Soap, Shelter and Salvation to our brothers and sisters in need of a helping hand. God blesses them, we should praise them.Mike BirkholmPast ChairmanLos Angeles Metropolitan Advisory BoardSouthern California DivisionThe Salvation ArmyAnd Past PresidentRotary Club of Los Angeles
ppcllc - March 15, 2010 at 3:32 pm
Let the critics get off their high horses. Salvation Army officers barely make subsistence wages. Try living on their salaries. It ain’t easy.
rocketpreacher - March 15, 2010 at 8:38 pm
I spent 12 years as a Salvation Army Officer. I resigned in 2006. I can tell you that between the 65-85 hours a week that I put in and the 30-45 hours per week that my wife put in annually our actual (combined as a couple) pay came to about $1.60 per hour. The houses that The Salvation Army owned and allowed us to live in rent free were valued at the bottom of the local markets. My children were stacked like cordwood in their tiny bedrooms, one for three of my boys and one for my daughter. The roof leaked, there was severe mold damage around the chimney, there was little money to heat the house in the local budget so we kept the temperature at 65 degrees in the winter time and at 85 in the summer time. We had to purchase our uniforms that we were required to wear 6 to 7 days a week and if they were damaged (and this happened a lot) we had to purchase them again. These cost several hundred dollars.How many CEOs of local 1.5 million dollar nonprofit operations with responsibility over multiple locations, multiple programs, multiple departments, multiple staff, hundreds of volunteers a day, multiple budgets, etcetera and serving hundreds of clients per day, do you know that would accept pay at $1.60 per hour and those living conditions?I can tell you unless you are close friends of Salvation Army officers or maybe a local pastor of another church that does perhaps less than half of the work of a Salvation Army officer – you don’t know anyone in the USA that receives that level of pay and those accomodations for the amount of work that they do.I left The Salvation Army as an officer partially because I really could not financially afford that level of pay and partially in order to complete my educational goals. I love The Salvation Army! But, they seriously need to pay their officer’s a real living wage in the USA and abroad! The real issue is the religious discrimination and harrassment that Ex-Salvation Army Officer’s receive when they are looking for a comparable nonprofit job that they are more than qualified to receive!