American Leprosy Missions, Inc.
Summary
American Leprosy Missions ("ALM") provides care, cure, and holistic rehabilitation to people around the world with leprosy and disabilities. ALM strives to minister hope and restoration for those suffering with the disease. ALM strives to be an enabler, training health and development workers with appropriate skills and working with and through partner organizations. ALM incorporates Christian witness into its programs wherever possible. ALM supported services address spiritual, physical, social, economic and psychological needs, helping people with leprosy break the cycle of hopelessness and maximize opportunities for fullness of life. The ministry now supports more than 150 projects in 24 countries. ALM was founded in 1906. This organization is a nonprofit. Contributions to it are fully tax deductible to the extent allowed by law. It is a member of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA).
Contact Information: [ Back to top ]
| Mailing Address: | 1 Alm Way
Greenville, SC
29601-9948 |
| Website: | www.leprosy.org |
| Phone: | (864) 271-7040, (800) 543-3135 |
| Email: | You need to enable javascript to see the email |
Organization Details [ Back to top ]
EIN: 135562163
| CEO/President: |
Mr. Christopher Doyle |
Tax Deductible: |
Yes |
| Chairman: |
Mr. Neal Joseph |
Fiscal Year End: |
December 31 |
| Board Size: |
15 |
Financial info from: |
Audit |
| Founder: |
|
Member of ECFA: |
Yes |
| Year Founded: |
1906 |
Member of ECFA since: |
1981 |
American Leprosy Missions ("ALM") provides care, cure, and holistic rehabilitation to people around the world with leprosy and disabilities. ALM strives to minister hope and restoration for those suffering with the disease. ALM strives to be an enabler, training health and development workers with appropriate skills and working with and through partner organizations. ALM incorporates Christian witness into its programs wherever possible. ALM supported services address spiritual, physical, social, economic and psychological needs, helping people with leprosy break the cycle of hopelessness and maximize opportunities for fullness of life. The ministry now supports more than 150 projects in 24 countries. ALM was founded in 1906.
This organization is a nonprofit. Contributions to it are fully tax deductible to the extent allowed by law. It is a member of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA).
American Leprosy Missions' Mission Statement is:
To serve as a channel of the love of Christ to people with leprosy and to those with disabilities, helping them to be healed in body and spirit and to be restored to lives of dignity and usefulness within their communities.
Program Accomplishments [ Back to top ]
- Two nurses and four nursing assistants were trained in Queimados and Belford Rozo.
- The Paul Brand outpatient clinic is now under construction. Soon leprosy patients and others in South India?s Katpadi area will have their own primary healthcare clinic.
- The new IESA health clinic and rehabilitation center will soon be serving leprosy patients and others in the Benguela region of Angola.
- Twenty tutoring programs for kids 4-17 are reaching over 1,100 children in Ethiopia.
Statement of Faith [ Back to top ]
American Leprosy Missions uses the following to express its Statement of Faith (adopted from the National Association of Evangelicals):
1.We believe the Bible to be the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God.
2.We believe that there is one God, eternally existent in three persons; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
3.We believe in the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ, in His virgin birth, in His sinless life, in His miracles, in His vicarious and atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father, and in His personal return in power and glory.
4.We believe that for the salvation of lost and sinful man, regeneration by the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential, and that this salvation is received through faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord and not as a result of good works.
5.We believe in the present ministry of the Holy Spirit by whose indwelling the Christian is enabled to live a godly life and to perform good works.
6.We believe in the resurrection of both the saved and the lost; they that are saved unto the resurrection of life and they that are lost unto the resurrection of damnation.
7.We believe in the spiritual unity of believers in our Lord Jesus Christ.
American Leprosy Missions was begun in 1906 by Christian missionaries. In those days, healthworkers could do little more than provide clean bandages, a safe haven, and Christian love.
Today leprosy can be cured. During the early 1980s, ALM became one of the first agencies to use the new multidrug therapy (MDT) in its projects to cure leprosy.
For decades, ALM has supported specialized leprosy hospitals, missions, and government leprosy campaigns.
This "top- down" model is gradually being replaced by a model of "integrated care." This means that leprosy services are provided in general health centers by general health workers. It also means community-based services that are provided with other medical, social, and economic services. Leprosy patients do not need to be isolated from the general population.
ALM's vision remains constant. Yesterday and today, they are Christ's servants, freeing the world of leprosy.
American Leprosy Missions has communicated the following needs:
There is a great need for funding the medicines needed to cure leprosy. A year long treatment to cure this diease is $240.00. If one can not fund the whole treatment other amounts would greatly appreciated also. This month's focus is on getting these meds to the children with Leprosy.
An additional project called Centennial Celebration has begun a campaign in hopes of raising enough money by the year 2006 to fund research for a Leprosy vaccine. This will be the 100th Birthday of ALM.
Research Analysis
Transparency Grade [ Back to top ]
| Transparency Grade of : A |
| Criteria category | Grade | Other Comments |
| Timeliness: | 100 | 5/16/2005 5:11:18 PM: Organization made financial information available less than 5 ½ months after their fiscal year end. |
| Financial Information: | 100 | 5/16/2005 5:11:35 PM: Organization provided all financial information requested. Information was clear and thorough. |
| Foundational Clarity: | | |
| Level of Cooperation: | | |
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MinistryWatch.com 5 Star Financial Efficiency Ratings [ Back to top ]
| Ranking Category | Rating | Overall Rank | Relief and Development Sector |
|---|
| Overall Efficiency Rating |  | 351 of 352 | 54 of 54 |
| Fund Acquisition Decision |  | 347 of 352 | 54 of 54 |
| Resource Allocation Decision | | 317 of 352 | 53 of 54 |
| Asset Utilization Decision | | 332 of 352 | 53 of 54 |
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Ministry Statement or Response [ Back to top ]
There is something about human nature and the need to somehow put a measure on the effectiveness of charities as it relates to finances and fundraising. While well intentioned, all such attempts to date have fallen short of their intended goal: guiding donors and informing them of the ?best? organizations to invest their funds. Wall Watchers? rating system is no exception.
Why do these attempts fall short? For several reasons:
- They lump all organizations together and end up comparing apples to oranges to bananas.
- They never measure program effectiveness which, at the end of the day, lets donors know how their money is being effectively used.
- They don?t consider anomalies like bad economic times, start-up costs, larger gifts, unusual expenses, etc.
- They look at one year and not history.
- They all compare differently. Some compare income as a measure, others measure expenses. It makes it difficult to compare one ?watch dog?s? assessment to another.
Some of the factors that make it difficult to compare one organization to another are:
- Gifts-in-kind (GIK)?Organizations that deal heavily in GIK programs can present very high program ratios. The GIK counts as ?contributions? on the income side and 100% program on the expense side. They can actually mask very poor fundraising performance that only can be seen if you carefully analyze cost only.
- Government grants?Organizations that receive 50% or more of their budget from government funding can also show very high ratios. That is because the grants come with very little fundraising effort, and even the efforts to get and expend the funds are all charged to program.
- Overseas staff?Some organizations maintain a high number of staff overseas instead of in the USA. Generally, anyone working overseas is considered ?program? whether or not they work in fundraising programs like child sponsorship.
- Child sponsorship programs (CSP)?So much of the support activity for CSP is done overseas. However, most of those costs are not recognized as fundraising expense but as program. Also, CSP have very high long-term value for their donors and hence, need less spent on donor cultivation or new donor acquisition?both of which are expensive fundraising costs.
- Missionaries raising support--Most organizations that recruit and send missionaries require them either to raise their own support (deputation) or to spend a year of home service every three-to-four years working to raise support for the organization. Since deputation is considered ?ministry? these fundraising costs are charged to program. Hence some mission organizations employ hundreds of ?fundraisers? and none of their activity is ever charged to fundraising.
- ?Celebrity CEO?s??It is not uncommon today for non-profits to have celebrities as their CEO, president or board chair. These people work for minimal or no pay but raise a tremendous amount of awareness and funds for the organization. You cannot put a value on these efforts but they do contribute to much higher ROI. Some organizations that are well known or well connected have this advantage that is not available to smaller, lesser-known entities.
- Expense Allocation?Many organizations get very creative in how they allocate expenses between fundraising and program. It is not uncommon to split the costs of newsletters, TV programs, and mailings because they contain certain amounts of ?public education? and thus qualify as a program expense. Charities that make the decision to honestly charge all such costs to fundraising are ?punished? with lower ratios only because they take the high road.
With all these variables, how can organizations effectively be measured? Over the years, the National Charities Information Bureau (NCIB) has taken perhaps the most reasoned approach. After taking out GIK donations and expenses, they consider what percentage of total expenses (not income) was spent on program activities. Their benchmark is that at least 60% of expenditures should go towards programs. (NCIB has recently merged with the Council of Better Business Bureaus.)
Why measure expenses and not revenue? Because one large gift, legacy or grant in the last part of the year, that could not possibly be spent, could throw the numbers way off. Expenses measure what actually went out the door in a given year. If at least 60% of these expenses went towards program that fulfilled the mission of the organization, then the public can be assured that their money is being spent as intended.
In the end, finances only tell half of the story, if that much. A charity with low administrative overhead may mean that no one is there minding the store and that programs are very ineffective and a lot of waste is going on undetected. There are many watchdog groups out there who are all trying to rate charities with letter grades, stars, points and percentages. But they all miss the bottom line: How effective are the organization?s program efforts? These are never measured because it is a time consuming process. It is easy to sit in an office somewhere with an annual report, an audit and a tax return and crank out some kind of analysis. It takes getting out of the office to measure programs. To date no watchdog group has taken on that task which is to the detriment of their efforts.
American Leprosy Missions meets the NCIB requirements, and the Council of Better Business Bureau standards. ALM is also a member in good standing of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA) and is audited each year by an outside accounting firm, Tait, Weller & Baker of Philadelphia. Our annual audit as well as our 990 tax return is always available and open for public inspection. And we publish an annual report that details the effectiveness of our programs for all to see.
Wall Watchers is well intended. But they are choosing the wrong things to measure. They also compare organizations together like they are all apples, which they are not. Thus Wall Watchers is doing a disservice to donors and only further muddying the waters.
Financial Information:
| Balance Sheet |
| Assets | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| Cash | $2,121,179 | $1,204,075 | $845,409 | $1,052,300 | $359,107 |
| Receivables, Inventories & Prepaids | $226,472 | $736,027 | $1,317,141 | $1,174,042 | $685,090 |
| Short-Term Investments | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Other Current Assets | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Total Current Assets | $2,347,651 | $1,940,102 | $2,162,550 | $2,226,342 | $1,044,197 |
| Long-Term Investments | $7,234,817 | $7,282,056 | $6,747,267 | $6,143,998 | $5,813,021 |
| Fixed Assets | $775,616 | $820,756 | $817,116 | $875,285 | $965,816 |
| Other Long-Term Assets | $5,446,758 | $5,054,584 | $4,630,572 | $4,428,102 | $4,261,940 |
| Total Long-Term Assets | $13,457,191 | $13,157,396 | $12,194,955 | $11,447,385 | $11,040,777 |
| TOTAL ASSETS | $15,804,842 | $15,097,498 | $14,357,505 | $13,673,727 | $12,084,974 |
| Liabilities | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| Payables & Accrued Expenses | $417,832 | $274,105 | $212,483 | $204,557 | $150,198 |
| Other Current Liabilities | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Total Current Liabilities | $417,832 | $274,105 | $212,483 | $204,557 | $150,198 |
| Debt | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Due To (From) Affiliates | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Other Long-Term Liabilities | $1,006,326 | $1,039,274 | $846,929 | $918,835 | $1,018,263 |
| Total Long-Term Liabilities | $1,006,326 | $1,039,274 | $846,929 | $918,835 | $1,018,263 |
| TOTAL LIABILITIES | $1,424,158 | $1,313,379 | $1,059,412 | $1,123,392 | $1,168,461 |
| Assets | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| Unrestricted | $7,878,260 | $7,628,296 | $7,731,374 | $7,267,813 | $5,902,826 |
| Temporarily Restricted | $509,980 | $551,654 | $377,520 | $346,793 | $366,356 |
| Permanently Restricted | $5,992,444 | $5,604,169 | $5,189,199 | $4,935,729 | $4,647,331 |
| NET ASSETS | $14,380,684 | $13,784,119 | $13,298,093 | $12,550,335 | $10,916,513 |
| Revenue and Expenses |
| Revenue | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| Total Contributions | $7,058,968 | $7,087,148 | $7,575,572 | $8,158,828 | $6,648,211 |
| Program Service Revenue | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Membership Dues | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Investment Income | $434,982 | $533,832 | $225,960 | $215,819 | ($97,587) |
| Other Revenue | $438,293 | $507,930 | $354,983 | $11,912 | $7,334 |
| Total Other Revenue | $873,275 | $1,041,762 | $580,943 | $227,731 | ($90,253) |
| TOTAL REVENUE | $7,932,243 | $8,128,910 | $8,156,515 | $8,386,559 | $6,557,958 |
| Expenses | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| Program Services | $4,908,121 | $5,056,477 | $5,038,555 | $4,838,341 | $5,058,516 |
| Management & General | $488,249 | $488,540 | $609,385 | $507,401 | $560,375 |
| Fundraising | $1,939,308 | $2,097,867 | $1,760,817 | $1,781,218 | $2,093,086 |
| TOTAL EXPENSES | $7,335,678 | $7,642,884 | $7,408,757 | $7,126,960 | $7,711,977 |
| Change in Net Assets | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
| SURPLUS (DEFICIT) | $596,565 | $486,026 | $747,758 | $1,259,599 | ($1,154,019) |
| Other Changes in Net Assets | $0 | $0 | $0 | $374,223 | $1,294,565 |
| TOTAL CHANGE IN NET ASSETS | $596,565 | $486,026 | $747,758 | $1,633,822 | $140,546 |