MARYLAND (WBFF) — As the General Assembly moves closer to passing another budget, a chunk of the funds will be allocated to nonprofit organizations – but the state’s comptroller, along with several state agencies, say they can’t provide the total dollar amount.
The comptroller’s website says the office oversees “every dollar in and every dollar out for the State.” When asked whether they track allocations to nonprofits, a spokesperson said many state systems don’t differentiate between nonprofits and other entities or businesses, and so they can’t provide the number.
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Comptroller Brooke Lierman publishes an Annual Comprehensive Financial Report which covers a lot of information about state spending, but not nonprofit grants.
The comptroller’s spokesperson said Spotlight on Maryland would have to contact state agencies that allocate the grants. Last year, The Baltimore Sun reached out to nearly every state agency asking how much money they give to nonprofits, and only a few provided specific dollar amounts, with some large departments saying they couldn’t provide the information.
Spotlight filed public information requests last month with several state agencies, asking them to provide their nonprofit contracts. So far, the Department of Natural Resources has provided several dozen contracts, saying more will be delivered in batches.
The Department of Housing and Community Development told Spotlight in response to its public information request that vendors aren’t differentiated in their system by corporate structure, so the requested data about nonprofits isn’t readily available to extract.
Doug Mayer, who served as communications director for former Republican Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, said while the comptroller’s office doesn’t typically keep information about total allocations to nonprofits, the agencies should be able to individually provide that information.
He added that if someone had asked him for that information while Hogan was in office, he would have asked every agency and they would have provided the number.
“That’s the difference between us and them,” Mayer said, referring to Hogan’s administration and the current administration. “Any cabinet level secretary saying that [they can’t provide the number]… is either lying or so incompetent they should be fired.”
Thomas Luke Spreen, associate professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, said that he’s not aware of any requirements that a comptroller’s ACFR should display the dollar amount for contracts with nonprofits versus for-profits.
But he added that the comptroller regularly produces research reports and could undertake to study this question. The General Assembly also could ask the comptroller or the Maryland Department of Legislative Services to prepare such a study.
“But both entities would face the challenge I noted above,” Spreen said in an email. “[W]ithout a specific flag for the type of vendor, they would need to figure it out based on other information about the grant/contract, like the name of the awardee.”
Have a news tip? Contact Brooke Conrad at bjconrad@sbgtv.com or 443-578-2126, or contact the Spotlight team at SpotlightOnMaryland@sbgtv.com or 410-467-4670. Spotlight on Maryland is a joint venture by The Baltimore Sun, FOX45 News
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