News Flash: Homeless, Inc. lady makes bank

Remember Sharon Lee of the Low Income Housing Institute?  (That’s the group that was co-founded by Scott Morrow in 1991 and is now hosting one of the downtown Nickelsville. The one with all the kiddies.)

She made $167,000 at LIHI in 2011.
Probably more than that in 2012.
And probably than that in 2013.

Here’s an extract from the 990 tax form LIHI filed with the IRS in 2011:

{Click on the image to enlarge it.}

See LIHI’s full 990 form here.

In 2011 LIHI’s total assets were valued at $50 million and, according to their 990 (Page 9), they took in nearly $10 million dollars last year, when you add up all the:

• Government Grants
• Private Gifts
• Asset Sales
• Fundraising Events
• Rental Income
• Property Management Fees
• Development Fees
• Cash Flow Fees (?)
• Resident Service Fees

Ten mils. That’s a lot money, huh? And $3.7  million of that came from government assistance alone. That’s money out of our pockets, folks. From which Ms. Lee took $167k, right off the top.

Now you’d think an outfit like this would do things above-board, wouldn’t you? That’s what LIHI’s CFO Lynne Behar told me, anyway: She said that LIHI is 100% transparent and that they ALWAYS do things by the book.

So that leaves me puzzling over a few things. Like why, for example, when I asked Ms. Lee to tell where Nickelsville’s new squat was gonna be back in July, so maybe the neighbors could get some advance notice, she refused. She just dummied up. She knew where it was gonna be, but she didn’t tell me, because then the neighbors might have found out, and some of them might have actually taken preventive measures.

The City ordinance says Nickelsville’s supposed to give the neighborhoods they move into some notice, but they sure didn’t do that with the LIHI property at 20th and Jackson. They just showed up one day, much to the neighbors’ surprise. But that’s how Nickelsville ALWAYS operates. They move in and tell the neighbors later. And they do that for the very obvious reason that once they’re there, it’s much harder to get them out.

They did the same thing in Highland Park. They did the same thing Skyway. They did the same thing downtown. And SHARE has done the same thing with its Tent Cities. Repeatedly. They almost always move in first – in violation of the law – and apply for their permit and tell the neighbors later.

And you know what else? They always have an accomplice.

–With the Tent Cities, it’s usually some church.
–With Nickelsville, it was Mayor McDim.
–With Skyway, it was James Chan and the Department of Permitting.
–With 20th and Jackson, it was LIHI.

Can you see what’s going on here?

These folks are working the system, just like they worked it with HSD’s “no-receipts-needed” contracts.

But I regress . . . What I really wanted to talk about was Sharon Lee, because I think she’s really the biggest accomplice of all. And it makes sense when you think about it. Because, of all the people in Scott Morrow’s Little Black Book, hers is probably the only name listed twice. It’s listed once because because she’s now the big-time CEO of the organization Scott co-founded. And knowing Scott like I do, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Ms. Lee owed him a favor or two. Or three.

But she’s also listed in the Little Black Book for another reason. Because, remember, she also controls properties that Shmorrow (SHARE + Morrow) supposedly “rents” and then bills the city for. Except maybe she really doesn’t rent them, because when I asked her to provide me with receipts showing that Shmorrow actually paid some of that money they got from the City to rent those properties . . . it was nothing doing. Ms. Lee either wouldn’t or couldn’t provide those receipts. (I suspect the latter.)

A reasonable person might ask: “Well, Ms. Lee . . .  What happened to that money?”

So just add this little bit of information to what I’ve already told you about Ms. Lee. All together, here’s what we know about her and her organization:

• Ms. Lee is boss of a non-profit organization that Scott Morrow co-founded: LIHI.
• LIHI gets most of its capitalization from the taxpayers.
• LIHI controls properties that Shmorrow uses to bill the city for shelter services.
• Last summer, Ms. Lee came forward in a City Council meeting and “volunteered” one of her properties to host Nickelsville.
• When I asked Ms. Lee to tell me where that property was, she refused.
• When I asked Ms. Lee to show me the receipts showing that SHARE had paid LIHI for the use of the Frye Apartments as winter shelter in 2011, she refused.

And now . . . the cherry on the sundae

• Ms. Lee takes in $167k a year.

Oh, and by the way . . .

• Ms. Lee donated some of that money back to Mike McGinn’s reelection campaign.
• And so did her ex-husband, who also works for Homeless, Inc.

Oh, and by the way, she names apartment buildings after her friends in politics . . .

Warning: Graphic boredom

Coming soon: “McGinn Place” ? “Morrow House” ?

For more about Sharon Lee: go here.

Her bio says she’s got a Masters of Architecture from M.I.T.* But I think she studied accounting at Enron University.

Anyway, you wanna see what kind of architecture the geeks from M.I.T. are turning out lately? Here it is, straight from the LIHI Web page:

Nickelsville Jr. Fun for children of all ages!

Gee . . . thanks, Sharon.

*Oh. Huh. MA from M.I.T. huh?  Anyone wanna check on that for me?