Foundation Leader Covers Charity’s Debt

The founder and chief executive of the Tides Foundation provided the money needed to repay what had been stolen from the nonprofit organization Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or Acorn, The New York Times reports.

Drummond Pike did not confirm or deny to the Times that he had bailed out the family of his friend, Wade Rathke, the Acorn founder whose brother, Dale, had stolen nearly $1-million from the organization.

But e-mail messages between executives at Acorn, obtained by the Times, show that Mr. Pike was the anonymous donor who had volunteered to repay the organization on behalf of the Rathke family, the newspaper reports.

Wade Rathke is a member of the board of the Tides Foundation but has taken a leave of absence, the article says.

(Free registration is required to view this article.)