A charity established by Rick Santorum to help low-income people in his home state of Pennsylvania spent most of its money on fund raising, consulting, administration, and office rent paid to one of the Republican White House hopeful’s political allies, according to The Washington Post.

From its establishment in 2001 by then-Senator Santorum until it closed six years later, Operation Good Neighbor raised $2.58-million and gave 39 percent of that to groups working directly with the needy. Ken Berger of watchdog group Charity Navigator called that ratio of mission-to-operational spending “exceptionally poor.”

Operation Good Neighbor has personnel and donor overlap with the former senator’s political organizations, with Robert Bickhart, a GOP strategist and Mr. Santorum’s campaign finance director, serving as the its executive director for four years and collecting rent on office space his consulting firm leased to the charity.

Robert Pratter, a member of the charity’s board, said its spending on fund raising and consulting as reasonable and that it provided much-needed help to struggling “mom-and-pop groups” that received checks of $6,000 to $15,000.