non profit vent

Today is Wednesday.  It is the second of two very long weeks.  But Saturday is within my grasp.  And after that, a four day Memorial Day weekend is on the horizon.  I’m kind of used to this crazy… and completely okay with it, because… really… after this, summer offers up a reprieve.  Not to mention, I typically have a surplus of vacation time to use up at this time of year… and a replenishing in time for summer.

The only caveat to that is that I have to schedule my time around an audit.  The thing I absolutely hate most about my job.  Because what it means for me is that I typically can’t take vacation when I want to (the week of my birthday) and instead have to sit and wait nine hours a day for accountants to ask me questions about my potential to be a criminal.  And even when I anticipate it after seven years of practice, I still go home feeling like my soul has suffered a skinned knee.  That someone could a. look at me and let the thought enter their head that I would be capable of such deceit and b. have the imagination to contrive such dishonesty… or c. the imagination comes from the fact that another person in another organization has already committed that crime.

And that last bit is the truth.  It makes me sick.  People have manipulated and corrupted the qualification of non-profit to launder money, embezzle, and create a subterfuge of good intentions so much that legitimate causes that hope to benefit those who don’t have money or resources have to arm themselves with agonizing audits and scrutiny to prove they aren’t misusing their status.

So.  The IRS investigated a bunch of non-profits.  With a conservative bent.  Well that’s what the media tells us, anyway.  Especially the media with a conservative bent… the ones who act like a scraped knee is an amputation.  But, whatever.  It’s happening.  I’m not going to deny it.

I am going to say, however, it’s karma.  I’m not saying this is an excuse for the target… or even justification.  But, to all the whiners about being investigated… and still somehow not losing the status (the detail always miraculously edited out of the story), if you want to be a non-profit, you shouldn’t expect a free pass.  You want to point a finger at the legitimacy of organizations that give things away to poor people or brown people as ripping off the system, well then you shouldn’t have a problem proving your legitimacy to the country.

I don’t pretend for two seconds that this sentiment isn’t laced with bitterness.  But, seriously, the system is rigged.  It already hurts the little people who don’t have the volume of Fox News to whine for them.  You wanted in on the club, suck it up.

I, meanwhile, am planning my vacation in August.  Complete with a major party the Saturday after the auditors leave.