tiwabu@newsobserver.com
Jennifer Pierce with Share Our Shoes checks the donated shoes stored at the group's office. Pierce said the recent allegations against her non-profit organization that it sells the donated shoes for profit are false. A legal disclaimer posted on the group's online and office states "items donated to Share Our Shoes.. may be sold to a third party." She said the proceeds are used to cover the costs of operations.
The N.C. Secretary of State is threatening to revoke the charity license for Share our Shoes, a prominent Raleigh organization, if it fails to account for tens of thousands of dollars spent on a variety of expenses, including some that have no connection to providing footwear to the needy here and abroad.
Share our Shoes has 10 days from the receipt of the notice to explain expenditures such as $99 for teeth whitening, $30 for a martial arts school and $17.23 at a Nash County ABC store, and roughly $47,000 in checks to the charity’s board members, staff and related businesses.
The notice was dated Feb. 9, but it’s unclear exactly when it was received by the charity.
Jennifer Pierce, the charity’s founder and president, said in a phone interview that she did use the charity’s accounts to pay for personal expenses, but she later reimbursed them. She said she will be providing records to the state to show no wrongdoing.
“It’s just a matter of not having my own debit card with me,” she said.
In less than two years, Pierce had built the shoe charity into a dynamo, with collection boxes across the Triangle collecting hundreds of thousands of pairs of shoes. The charity took off after an earthquake ravaged Haiti two years ago. Share our Shoes’ latest tax return showed more than $860,000 in charitable donations of cash and shoes.
But last November, concerns rose when a North Raleigh church learned that the shoes it had collected and the $5,000 in cash it had raised had not yet gone to Haiti. In subsequent news reports, Pierce had to explain that some of the shoes the charity collects are sold to help pay the nonprofit’s expenses, which included her roughly $62,000 salary. The charity later reported the church’s shoes and cash were used to help Haiti’s needy.
The Secretary of State’s Charitable Solicitation Licensing section said it had received two complaints in September and October of last year alleging that Pierce was selling donated shoes and keeping the proceeds for personal use.
Pierce, 33, is a convicted felon and recovering drug addict who said starting the charity helped keep her straight. The state in November requested numerous records to track the charity’s finances and operation, and its notice said the charity provided an “incomplete” response.
The records the state did obtain showed hundreds of expenditures and transactions totaling roughly $95,000 that investigators said need further explanation.
“Based upon a preponderance of the evidence cited in this Notice, the (Secretary of State’s office) has concluded that there is a substantial likelihood that Share Our Shoes has failed to apply contributions in a manner substantially consistent with the purpose for which they were solicited ...” stated the state’s notice to the charity.
Failure to respond to the notice constitutes grounds for the state to pull the charity’s license.
