Lo Vista Hotel

Doubts have come to light regarding a San Diego non-profit agency called the American Combat Veterans of War or ACVOW. The organization possesses an a workspace at the Va hospital in La Jolla, CA and is operated nearly entirely by volunteers. They claim to help vets secure their benefits and boast about their solutions to aid warriors with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The problem? No accountability. The staff has existed for over 10 years, but runs below the radar. A check on Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau’s Charity Index make absolutely no mention of ACVOW. Nor does ACVOW possess any meaningful record of the success they’ve enjoyed helping veterans and active duty personnel. Likewise, ACVOW just lost a small claims court battle for refusing to pay one of its personnel. A Utah News post from June of this past year suggests that one of ACVOW’s officers used funding from the group in order to bail out an anti-immigration activist from jail, an obvious breach of the terms for many 501(c)(3) non-profit associations. This article is not implying that that ACVOW is undertaking in unlawful action. There are undoubtedly serious ethical concerns and potential donors should be wary whenever contributing to organizations devoid of budgetary accountability.