Petrelis Files

New HIV Accountability Site: NMAC and Transparency?

Greg J. Milward is a person living with AIDS and an accountability activist keeping tabs on AIDS Inc, and he does so from fly-over country. He's based in Madison, Wisconsin, and recently created a new site called USAHIV.com and I urge you to read it. There is far too little accountability work being performed these days, and in so many ways, Greg's voice is very needed.

A simple and potent agenda:

USAHIV.com operates on the fundamental belief that HIV/AIDS organizations have an obligation to operate in an open and transparent manner . . . Accountability and transparency, while a simple concept, is one that many have found a bitter pill to swallow . . .

Excellent use of a powerful metaphor, one that PWAs know from downing daily cocktails to ward off opportunistic infections and extend our lives.

Greg's most recent post sheds light on the shameful longstanding and continuing lack of transparency from a large national organization:

The National Minority AIDS Council is headquartered in Washington, D.C. . . . 
We calling on Paul Kawata, [the group's director] to make available, at a minimum, the following information:

• The last three years of NMAC’s IRS form 990 filings
• The last three years of Independent Financial Audits of NMAC
• The last three years of Annual Reports
• NMAC governing documents (bylaws, etc.)

None of these basic documents are available on the NMAC website . . . :

• 2008 Net loss of $ 389,251
• 2009 Net loss of $ 527,542
• 2010 Net loss of $   52,531
• 2011 Net loss of $ 937,627

That’s a cumulative NET LOSS of $1,906,771 over the past four years.  Losses in each of the past four years is problematic and raises many questions that deserve to be answered.

This is speaking truth to power and deserves the support of all PWAs and AIDS Inc watchdogs.

Yes, Greg is echoing calls I've made for Kawata to get with the transparency agenda and it's my hope that his demand for Kawata to finally provide much-needed accountability is the thing that brings NMAC out of fiscal darkness and into the sunlight.