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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 13, 2015)
News Page 4 Street Roots • Nov. 13-19, 2015 Safety Net won't face criminal charges Federal investigators determine the nonprofit isn't criminally liable for mismanaging $1.4 million in disability benefits BY EMILY GREEN STAFF WRITER he federal investigation into nonprofit Safety Net of Oregon for ylfl mismanaging its clients’ disability benefits is closed and no criminal charges will be filed, the U.S. Attorney’s Office has announced. After the 19-mOnth investigation, officials determined neither Safety Net nor any of its employees were to be held liable for significant shortages in its collective account, said Ann Mohageri, a Social Security Administration spokesperspn. Linda Chapman (formerly Linda Stelling) and Mark Stelling ran Safety Net as CEO and president, respectively. The couple ended their 20-year marriage in January. More than 300 beneficiaries were owed a total of $1.4 million that, according to the nonprofit’s ledgers, should have been in its account but wasn’t All the misused funds were Title 2 and Title 16 Social Security disability benefits. The U.S. Attorney’s Office stated investigators determined the shortage was the result of “accounting and bookkeeping errors” in a press release issued Oct 16. Chapman had previously told investigators she believed the funds were missing due to a software problem. Safety Net,based in Portland, was Oregon’s largest payee service. It handled wo federal disability benefits for more than a thousand clients who were unable to million manage their finances independently due to physical or mental disabilities. Safety Net received Social Security benefit paid out, former clients who were still owed payments on behalf of its clients and was money became concerned. responsible for paying their “Social Security has been telling people rent, utilities and other bills, ‘Safety Net’s out of money,’” Kathy Wilde, and making sure there was litigation director at Disability Rights money left over to meet Oregon, told Street Roots in mid July. “A lot "The only beneficiaries their basic needs. of people have been told they’re S.O.L.” On March 6, 2014, as whom we are not paying Worried they wouldn’t get their money that had their funds mis- - previously reported by Street Roots, Safety Net was back, former Safety Net clients contacted used are those whom we Sen. Jeff Merkley’s office in July. His staff served with a federal search cannot locate? and those warrant following allegations worked with Disability Rights Oregon to alert the Social Security Administration of it was mismanaging client its responsibility under the law to repay funds. Investigators initially MOHAGERI, beneficiaries if the payee organization is believed $600,000 had beep unable to do so, according to the senator’s mismanaged. Less than one spokesperson, Courtney Crowell. month later, Safety Net When Street Roots asked the Social permanently closed, leaving Security Administration if it would be many of its clients repaying Safety Net’s former clients later financially insecure. that month, Mohageri said, “The only Over the next year, many former Safety beneficiaries whom we are not paying that Net clients struggled to find new payee had their funds misused are those whom we services and retrieve funds the now-defunct cannot locate, and those who are deceased.’ nonprofit owed to them. This past summer, as word spread that all The estates of the deceased are owed the money in Safety Net’s account had been $185,000 that was mismanaged by Safety a Net, and $62,000 that was recovered from its accounts. Mohageri told Street Roots her office would seek restitution from Safety Net to repay the estates of deceased beneficiaries still owed. When asked if those estates would go unpaid if no restitution is collected, she said the “issue is still under consideration.” The administration has since changed its stance, and Mohageri said earlier this month her agency is “developing estates for payment.” To date, the Social Security Administration has reimbursed 216 beneficiaries who were owed money out of the mismanaged $1.4 million - at a cost of $1.05 million to taxpayers. More than 700 clients received funds recovered from Safety Net. Many clients waited more than a year after Safety Net closed to receive funds they were owed. Ninety of the clients whose money was mismanaged have not been paid See SAFETY NET, page 5 Artwork by Chuck Dobson
