LDS big business

Mormon Church gives water to boost imperiled Great Salt Lake

SAM METZ
Fri, March 17, 2023

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Donating a small reservoir's worth of water rights to Utah's Great Salt Lake. Replacing grass with rocks and water-wise landscaping around neatly manicured churches. Reducing water use by more than one-third outside the headquarters in Salt Lake City's Temple Square. These are among the actions that the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is taking to address the realities of a rapidly approaching, drier future.

Remarks from Bishop Christopher Waddell at the University of Utah on Friday underscored how the church — one of the biggest land and water rights holders in the western United States — is expanding its role in conservation and looking for solutions “that protect the future for all God's children.”

“Our ability to be wise stewards of the earth is dependent on our understanding of the natural resources we have been blessed with,” the high-ranking church official said at a symposium on the future of the Great Salt Lake at the University of Utah’s S.J. Quinney College of Law.

Speaking after a long list of scientists and Republican Gov. Spencer Cox, Waddell said the church's focus on stewardship spanned back to the Brigham Young era, noting that the faith's forefather endorsed what one historian said was a “radical notion” — that water is a public resource, not just a matter of private property rights.

He said that the church was grateful for the wet winter — but unsurprised given the power of prayer — and urged members of the faith to conserve water and to not let the season's plentiful snowpack go to waste.

The church's expanded role in Utah's conservation efforts comes as an increasing number of large institutions acknowledge additional actions will likely be needed to prepare for challenges ahead in the drought-stricken western United States. Yet it is also reigniting recurring questions from a growing chorus of environmentalists and scientists about whether the region's leaders — in business, politics and religion — are acting aggressively enough to confront drought and its looming consequences.

An acre-foot is enough water to supply about two to three U.S. households for a year and the lake operates at a 1.2 million acre-foot deficit.

Church officials announced earlier this week that they planned to donate roughly 20,000 acre-feet of water rights to the Great Salt Lake, which has shrunk to its lowest levels ever due to a supply-demand imbalance caused by decadeslong regional drought. The church has at least 75,000 acre-feet of active water rights, the Salt Lake Tribune reported in February.

The church’s donation is roughly the size of a small reservoir and about 2% of what’s needed to keep the lake at its current level, according to research from a group of scientists led by Brigham Young University Ecologist Ben Abbott.

“It’s a drop in the bucket on one level, but it’s also a big drop,” Abbott said of the church’s donation.

Though there is less water now flowing through the rivers that have historically fed the lake, growing cities and farms continue to draw water, causing the lake's elevation to plummet. If the lake continues to shrink, it could risk being an ecological, economic and public health disaster; as more toxic dust is exposed on the shoreline, it will likely endanger native species, dirty the air in surrounding communities and reduce the “lake effect” snow that the state's ski industry relies on.

Scientists worry that if the lake's current trajectory continues, the surrounding areas could become desolate wastelands like the areas surrounding parts of inland California's Salton Sea and the Owens Valley.

Utah lawmakers have passed a variety of drought-related measures to make farming more efficient and to pay homeowners for replacing some grass. Yet they haven't advanced more drastic proposals on par with neighboring states, amid winter snowfall expected to temporarily stave off crises at both Lake Powell on the Utah-Arizona border and the Great Salt Lake.

“Mother nature really helped us out,” Republican Sen. Scott Sandall said earlier this month. “We didn’t have to pull that lever for emergency use.”

With scientists projecting that the lake could dry up in as soon as five years, demands have grown louder for lawmakers to commit to keeping the lake at a baseline elevation — and to consider more aggressive policies to ensure more water is delivered amid competing interests like municipal development and water intensive farms.

Though lawmakers and state leaders laud conservation efforts underway, they still plan to dam the Bear River — the largest tributary feeding the Great Salt Lake — and the Lake Powell Pipeline, which would siphon water from the shrinking reservoir that stores Colorado River water for seven U.S. states and Mexico.

“Our state leaders have failed to solve the Great Salt Lake crisis because they have turned their back on meaningful solutions to put water in the Lake,” Zach Frankel, the executive director of the Utah Rivers Council, said.

On Friday, Cox was firm in rebutting the idea that political leaders aren't doing enough to save the Great Salt Lake. He cautioned scientists about the degree of certainty with which they present “doom and gloom” projections, and warned activists that the aggressive policy changes they seek could kindle fierce public backlash and jeopardize progress.

“We are going faster than I ever thought we would go. But if we start confiscating farms and water shares, you will see politicians respond very quickly. People will run for office to make sure that we are not saving the Great Salt Lake," Cox said. "They will be elected. Those are the types of things that you have to think through."

SEC Charges The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Its Investment Management Company for Disclosure Failures and Misstated Filings

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
2023-35
Washington D.C., Feb. 21, 2023 —

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Ensign Peak Advisers Inc., a non-profit entity operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to manage the Church’s investments, for failing to file forms that would have disclosed the Church’s equity investments, and for instead filing forms for shell companies that obscured the Church’s portfolio and misstated Ensign Peak’s control over the Church’s investment decisions. The SEC also announced charges against the Church for causing these violations. To settle the charges, Ensign Peak agreed to pay a $4 million penalty and the Church agreed to pay a $1 million penalty.

The SEC’s order finds that, from 1997 through 2019, Ensign Peak failed to file Forms 13F, the forms on which investment managers are required to disclose the value of certain securities they manage. According to the order, the Church was concerned that disclosure of its portfolio, which by 2018 grew to approximately $32 billion, would lead to negative consequences. To obscure the amount of the Church’s portfolio, and with the Church’s knowledge and approval, Ensign Peak created thirteen shell LLCs, ostensibly with locations throughout the U.S., and filed Forms 13F in the names of these LLCs rather than in Ensign Peak’s name. The order finds that Ensign Peak maintained investment discretion over all relevant securities, that it controlled the shell companies, and that it directed nominee “business managers,” most of whom were employed by the Church, to sign the Commission filings. The shell LLCs’ Forms 13F misstated, among other things, that the LLCs had sole investment and voting discretion over the securities. In reality, the SEC’s order finds, Ensign Peak retained control over all investment and voting decisions.

“We allege that the LDS Church’s investment manager, with the Church’s knowledge, went to great lengths to avoid disclosing the Church’s investments, depriving the Commission and the investing public of accurate market information,” said Gurbir S. Grewal, Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. “The requirement to file timely and accurate information on Forms 13F applies to all institutional investment managers, including non-profit and charitable organizations.”

Ensign Peak agreed to settle the SEC’s allegation that it violated Section 13(f) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 13f-1 thereunder by failing to file Forms 13F and for misstating information in these forms. The Church agreed to settle the SEC’s allegation that it caused Ensign Peak’s violations through its knowledge and approval of Ensign Peak’s use of the shell LLCs.

Paul Feindt conducted the SEC’s investigation under the supervision of Tracy Combs and Tanya Beard of the Salt Lake Regional Office and Laura Metcalfe of the Denver Regional Office.

New database gives widest look ever at LDS Church landholdings. See what it owns and where.

Utah-based faith has at least 1.7M acres valued at $16B, making it the nation’s fifth largest private landowner.

Salt Lake Tribune
By Tony Semerad
April 5, 2022

From thousands of acres of farmlands to thousands of places of worship and from shiny commercial enclaves in urban centers to flowing fields in swelling suburbs, a newly released list shows The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints owns U.S. properties valued at nearly $16 billion and ranks the Utah-based faith among the nation’s top private landholders.

It may be no surprise that a growing pioneer-era church with millions of members — and devoted to acquiring land, cultivating crops, erecting temples and building Zion — would today hold vast expanses of property.

Still, the sheer scope of church-held domestic real estate yields mind-stretching numbers. And the findings emerge when many Latter-day Saints and church observers are already agog at other recently reported multibillion-dollar figures associated with the faith’s wealth.

This latest cache of data — captured in 2020 and released Tuesday by the Truth & Transparency Foundation (formerly known as MormonLeaks) — reveals a nearly 16,000-parcel collection of 1.7 million acres held by identified LDS Church firms. While the list is not complete, it nonetheless shows church lands in every state, just about every sizable metropolitan area and big blankets of territory in between.

Found in the church’s portfolio — along with the expected meetinghouses and temples — are office towers, shopping centers, residential skyscrapers, cattle ranches and high-mountain timberlands worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

The faith is now Florida’s biggest landowner, controlling well above 2% of its landmass, including an enormous collection of pasturelands outside resort-rich Orlando called Deseret Ranches and a recently acquired expanse of hundreds of thousands of forested acres in the Panhandle.

Church companies such as Property Reserve, Suburban Land Reserve and Farmland Reserve are sitting on large tracts of developable land in a host of American suburbs. These holdings are heavy in metro regions throughout the rapidly growing South and West — just as the U.S. economy is primed with high demand for new homebuilding.

Even this partial portfolio would make the church — with nearly 7 million members nationally and more than 16.6 million worldwide — the fifth largest private landowner in the U.S., according to The Land Report, which tracks holdings among some of the nation’s wealthiest families.

The report shows only California-based Sierra Pacific Industries, owned by a third-generation family with 2.3 million timberland acres; businessman and philanthropist John Malone, who led cable giant Tele-Communications Inc. (2.2 million acres); the Pacific Northwest’s Reed family (2.1 million acres); and CNN founder and media tycoon Ted Turner (2 million acres) have more.

Church holdings top $100 million in assessed valuation in at least 15 major urban centers — based on 2019 tax data — and exceed $25 million in at least 66 cities.

The data was built from a digital sifting of public property records in all U.S. counties. Truth & Transparency drew on a private, subscription-based commercial real estate data and research firm, Reonomy, whose algorithms correlated the records with thousands of other data points to confirm their ownership.

The foundation announced Monday it was ceasing operations, making the property investigation its last project published under the Truth & Transparency name.

“Like everyone, our lives have changed greatly in the past two years,” foundation co-founders Ryan McKnight and Ethan Gregory Dodge wrote in an account accompanying the release on the group’s website, “and we both feel this is the best decision moving forward for our personal and family lives.”

In response to a Salt Lake Tribune query, church spokesperson Doug Andersen said that “real estate holdings are used to fulfill the religious mission” of the faith.

“This includes,” he added, “providing for the welfare and humanitarian operations of the church; providing for religious worship (chapels, temples, missionary offices, educational centers and efforts and more); and preserving a sacred religious site or its surroundings and enhancing the character of the local community.”

Andersen said the global church follows the “Savior’s teaching that we should be ‘good and faithful’ stewards over the sacred donations that come from his followers (Matthew 25:14-21). This includes purchasing, holding and operating farms and other real estate properties as investments as a part of the church’s reserves.”

How much land and what it’s worth

Taken together, church properties on the Truth & Transparency list would cover about 1.3 million football fields, spread over at least 3,120 cities and towns and sparser rural areas in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

The portfolio has a value of $11.8 billion set by county assessors for tax purposes, McKnight said, but with a market value of $15.8 billion, established by Reonomy’s algorithms. And even that all but certainly lowballs the actual value of all the U.S. land the church owns.

The Tribune found several high-dollar church properties missing from the database, for instance, including some held under other church companies. And this tally excludes huge church landholdings internationally.

Patrick Mason, head of Mormon history and culture at Utah State University in Logan, called the $15.8 billion total a “staggering sum.”

“It helps us appreciate just how remarkably successful the church has been over the past half-century or more,” Mason said, “in transforming itself from a local, Intermountain West-based sectarian religion to one that really is pervasive throughout the United States.”

In terms of acreage, the properties listed — though likely undercounted and undervalued — exceed several estimates by scholars of the faith’s domestic landownership.

Properties extend far beyond chapels and temples

The list expands outward from a backbone of an estimated $8.3 billion in religious sites, ranging from thousands of utilitarian meetinghouses to scores of architecturally striking temples and adjoining spaces adorning city centers and ritzy suburbs.

There also are hundreds of exhibition halls, libraries, museums, schools, family centers and other sites ancillary to the faith.

Frequently clustered around Latter-day Saint temples, the portfolio’s most lucrative commercial holdings feature in the country’s top downtown cores. The church’s office, residential and retail towers rise up and down the East and West coasts. They also emanate from Utah into neighboring states — all part of the so-called Jell-O Belt — and across the U.S. interior.

Examples in Philadelphia (including a 30-plus-story apartment tower across the street from a temple), Chicago (a 40-story residential tower in the South Loop) and other cities offer distinct echoes of the mixed-use development model found at City Creek Center, with its stores, restaurants, condominiums and apartments near Salt Lake City’s Temple Square.

One church-backed project in the Mormon-settled suburb of Mesa, Ariz., could be dubbed City Creek South. It has all but replicated that urban in-fill approach, though on a smaller scale, with 12,500 square feet of ground-floor retail outlets, 240 apartments, 12 town homes, 70,000 square feet of landscaped open space and underground parking built around a renovated Mesa Temple served by light rail.

The makeover has revived an area in desperate need of a boost.

“There was a time where the heartbeat was difficult to find in downtown Mesa,” Mayor John Giles said last fall in a church news release. “...[The church’s] decision to invest in our downtown sent a great signal to the rest of the smart investors that said, ‘Well, gee, if they’re doing it, that’s a sign that it’s got potential.’”

Andersen, the church spokesperson, pointed to the Philadelphia and Mesa projects as examples of the faith’s investments “enhancing the character” of a community.

Lucrative office buildings also abound, including a $106 million complex in the Dallas Fort-Worth area that one of the church’s property arms leases to aerospace and defense firm Raytheon. The church also owns a complex in Austin and another in Minnetonka, Minn., both valued at over $40 million.

The list contains up to $696 million or more in residential lands, vacant spaces and other swaths in America’s suburbs, much of it poised for development. The database details a total of at least 181,000 acres in empty residential lands and vacant farmlands in larger and rapidly growing metro areas, places such as Tulsa, Okla.; Kansas City, Mo.; Lafayette, Ind.; Albany, Ga.; and Modesto, Calif. (where the church just announced plans to build a temple).

Plenty of farms crop up in church holdings

Perhaps the most impressive of the church’s lands in terms of acreage are some of its gargantuan food-production and cattle-growing operations, run by its farming subsidiaries, Farmland Reserve and AgReserve.

The database documents farm holdings worth at least $2.3 billion, with notably huge sections of it in Nebraska, rural Montana, Florida, Texas and Utah. Farms, ranches, pastures, orchards and other agricultural lands under church ownership stretch horizon to horizon, with tens of thousands of contiguous acres in many cases.

A church subsidiary called AgriNorthwest recently outbid a Bill Gates-owned company with an offer of $209 million to buy Easterday ranch properties in eastern Washington out of bankruptcy proceedings. The working ranch included 12,000 acres of potato, onion and cattle lands as well as valuable water rights.

Based on acreage, agriculture makes the church one of the nation’s largest holders of farmland and ranchland — and the country’s largest nut producer, centered on expansive orchards in Northern California. Its cattle operations brand it among the largest beef suppliers to the McDonald’s restaurant chain.

Though some of the food is sold commercially, it’s unknown just how much of the production is income-generating and how much goes toward the church’s far-reaching humanitarian operations and support for members worldwide. Nor is it clear what income is generated by its commercial properties, including substantial leasing income from office and retail tenants.

What else does the church own?

Between city jewels, lands for future homes and agricultural empires, the church appears to have a version of just about every other kind of parcel in between.

Its holdings include acres assessed for use as island resorts, hotels, airports, golf courses, amusement parks, theaters, vineyards, warehouses, truck stations, funeral homes, health clubs, mines and cemeteries. There are even millions of dollars in thousands of tiny odd-shaped parcels and other bits and pieces known as easements.

The continental breadth of the faith’s holdings is also astounding.

Its Eastern holdings sweep down into Key West on the southernmost tip of Florida — one of three states (besides Utah and California) on this list with at least $1 billion in church-owned land.

Head northward to the farthest tip of Maine, a state where the church holdings surpass $24 million, and you’ll find a three-acre lot and meetinghouse in the far northern border city of Caribou in Aroostook County.

Outside the contiguous U.S., the tally confirms the lucrative value of church properties in Honolulu as well as around Brigham Young University-Hawaii and the Polynesian Cultural Center, both in Laie. Last year, a church subsidiary bought a 200-room Residence Inn by Marriott on Maui for nearly $100 million.

In Alaska, the faith owns several multimillion-dollar properties in Anchorage and even a small lot in the North Pole, a town in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.

Conversely, Utah is the equivalent of a Latter-day Saint Vatican, at least in terms of property ownership.

The church’s legacy in the Beehive State has given it somewhere around $5.3 billion — yes, a third of the overall value in the database — in land across the state, including at least $3 billion in property stretching from Ogden to Provo.

Does the church pay taxes on all this land?

Church authorities have consistently said that their for-profit real estate and other business endeavors pay the required taxes.

The vast majority of church properties in the new database are categorized by county assessors for worship, making them tax-exempt.

Add to that a host of other special-purpose properties, dedicated public spaces, vacant areas and other kinds of low-producing acreage, and nearly $8.5 billion total assessed value in the church land portfolio potentially would qualify for lower local property taxes, not including farmlands.

Not so for $2.8 billion or so labeled on this list assessed as commercial properties. And it’s unclear from these records how income from these church-owned properties might be taxed.

While the governing First Presidency has said the church takes “seriously the responsibility to care for the tithes and donations received from members” and has insisted it “complies with all applicable law governing our donations, investments, taxes and reserves,” the faith discloses little about its extensive financial activities.

That bothers some members and nonmembers alike.

Chad Pomeroy, a law professor at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, wrote a 2019 article decrying a lack of financial transparency required of the church, given its tax-exempt status as a religion and a relative lack of financial reporting for all churches in the U.S.

When guessing about total LDS Church wealth, the scholar said, “some people call it ‘wild speculation.’”

“I don’t know if it’s wild, but it is speculative,” said Pomeroy, who graduated from BYU’s law school, “because we don’t get the information we’re asking for — even though, in effect, the U.S. taxpayer is underwriting the accumulation of this wealth.”

Irrespective of the shock value of dollar totals involved, he added, “what’s jarring to me is that you have a tax-exempt entity that’s allowed to aggregate this amount of assets without telling anybody what they’ve got.”

Why this wealth fits the Mormon model

The notion of owning land as a financial safeguard against devastation, both personally and at a community level, has remained deeply embedded in Mormon culture almost since the faith’s 1830 founding.

While Latter-day Saints make up only about 1 of every 100 Americans, their church has built business holdings from near bankruptcy in the 1960s to rival those of some of the largest and wealthiest institutions in the world.

Real estate — prized alongside entrepreneurialism by church leaders as a means of expansion since the days of early founder Joseph Smith and pioneer-prophet Brigham Young — has now blossomed into a multibillion-dollar affair, spanning continents.

Truth & Transparency Foundation’s release comes on the heels of other revelations regarding the faith’s finances, including assertions in late 2019 by a former church investment manager that its reserves topped $100 billion.

That portfolio, managed by Ensign Peak Advisors, the church’s investment arm, is currently reporting in federal filings a stock account above $52 billion.

Church leaders have said the reserves are a “rainy day” fund to help support global operations and guard against credit crunches, stock slides and recessions.

This land portfolio would represent about a third of what’s in Ensign Peak, which is only part of the church’s investment holdings. McKnight and others believe even the market values in the database are low estimates and that U.S. church lands could be as high as $25 billion to $30 billion in value.

In fact, Truth & Transparency believes its findings suggest the church has the “most valuable private real estate portfolio in the U.S.”

For all the church’s documented U.S. land wealth, scholarly research shows the denomination owns and manages large reserves of land in Britain — of a size rivaling the royal estate — along with massive acreages in Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina and Australia.

USU’s Mason said investing in land fits the church’s conservative buy-and-hold values in protecting its investments — born of the church’s financial difficulties in the 1950s and ‘60s.

“I know nothing about real estate development, except that they aren’t making any more land,” he said. “This seems very much like they are planning. They’re not just thinking about next year or five years from now. They’re thinking about 50 years from now.”

LDS Church discloses the $37.8 billion stock portfolio of its biggest investment fund

The Salt Lake City Tribune
By Nate Carlisle
March 7, 2020, 6:37 a.m.

For the first time, the LDS Church’s biggest investment fund has disclosed its Wall Street holdings, revealing $37.8 billion in stocks and mutual funds.

The federal filing may be the best answer ever to how The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has invested the excess tithing paid by its 16 million members. The detailed list included 1,659 stocks and mutual funds, including household names like Amazon, Chevron and Walmart, that the fund held for the quarter ending Dec. 31.

The investment fund, called Ensign Peak Advisors, quietly submitted the filing Feb. 14 to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The stock portfolio appears to represent a large portion of the total value of Ensign Peak, which whistleblowing brothers Lars and David Nielsen said in a complaint sent to the IRS controls assets worth at least $100 billion.

The SEC filing is standard for “institutional investment managers” with assets of at least $100 million.

Ensign Peak Advisors has met that threshold for years, yet the SEC website shows this is the first time the fund has submitted such a filing.

The LDS Church, through a spokesman, declined to answer questions about the recent filing or why it wasn’t submitted before.

“They may have previously read the rules to exempt advisers to religious institutions, and are now disclosing in light of the recent controversy,” said Jeff Schwartz, a University of Utah professor who focuses on corporate and securities law and reviewed the filing for The Salt Lake Tribune.

This filing doesn’t encompass all of the church’s financial holdings. Some assets are held in shell companies that file separately.

In 2018, The Truth and Transparency Foundation, the nonprofit newsroom behind the former MormonLeaks site with a stated mission to disclose information about religions, said it had found 13 such shell companies with assets of $32 billion.

Ensign Peak Advisors itself is far larger and more diversified than any of those smaller funds, the Feb. 14 filing shows. About $3 billion of the Ensign Peak Advisors stock holdings — or 7% of the value reported in the filing — was almost evenly split between Apple and Microsoft stock.

Two-thirds of Ensign Peak Advisors’ reported stock holdings came from 100 companies or mutual funds. Of those 100, the plurality of the investment — 26% — was in the technology sector.

The next two biggest sectors were health care, including Johnson & Johnson and Merck stocks; and financial services — stocks such as Bank of America and Berkshire Hathaway.

There also were investments in two Utah-based companies.

The fund reported owning $91.8 million of stock in Zions Bank. That bank can trace its history to a bank founded in 1873 by LDS Church President Brigham Young. The church sold its majority stake in Zions in 1960.

Ensign Peak Advisors also owned $76.7 million of stock in Pluralsight, an online education company based in Farmington.

While the LDS Church owns for-profit insurance and personal investment businesses as well as radio stations and Salt Lake City’s NBC affiliate, KSL-Channel 5, Ensign Peak Advisors invested in those businesses’ competitors. It owned stock in SiriusXM, the three companies that combine to own the local ABC, CBS and FOX affiliates, and in The New York Times Co.

The church counsels its members to not consume tobacco, alcohol or hot caffeinated drinks. And the portfolio reflects that. There were no cigarette or beer manufacturers, nor was there an investment in a coffee chain, such as Starbucks.

Of the 30 companies that comprise the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Coca-Cola is the only one Ensign Peak Advisors did not invest in. The fund didn’t own stock in soda makers PepsiCo or Keurig Dr Pepper, either.

Caffeinated sodas are not part of the church’s health code, known as the Word of Wisdom.

The SEC filing discloses only Ensign Peak Advisors’ holdings in publicly traded companies or funds, and such filings do not include investments in real property or private companies.

How the LDS Church plays the stock market has been the subject of speculation for decades. After the church in 2018 expressed opposition to medical cannabis, for example, some online forums wondered if the reticence was influenced by church investments in pharmaceutical companies that sell opioids.

Roger Clarke, the head of Ensign Peak Advisors, told The Wall Street Journal last month that one reason for the shell companies was to make church investments harder to track so that parishioners with insufficient information didn’t mismanage their own portfolios by trying to mimic what Ensign Peak Advisors was doing. The Journal reported that the fund also owns Florida timberland and investments in big hedge funds.

D. Michael Quinn, a historian who has focused on LDS Church finances, said it’s no surprise the church invests in blue chips stocks. But the specifics offered in the SEC filing represent a milestone for an institution that has been famously secretive about its money.

“It’s great detail that we haven’t had before,” Quinn said, “but it’s only part of the picture.”

Quinn says Ensign Peak Advisors is just one of the church’s investment firms. There are other firms working on both the nonprofit and for-profit sides of the church that combine to handle even more money than the $100 billion Ensign Peak Advisors is said to be worth.

As to Clarke’s concern, Quinn suspects only journalists, academics and historians will be interested in studying the portfolio. He doubts rank-and-file Latter-day Saints will refer to the SEC document for investment advice.

“Members of the church don’t need to do extensive research to invest in blue chip stocks,” Quinn said.

Schwartz, the law professor, believes any penalty Ensign Peak Advisors might face for failing to file a quarterly report until now would be light by the standards of a multibillion-dollar fund. He found one case in which an investment firm failed to file the necessary reports for three years. The SEC issued a fine of $100,000.

“It doesn’t seem like there would be huge penalties,” Schwartz said.

If Ensign Peak continues issuing quarterly reports, the next one would be available on the SEC website in mid-May.

The Nielsen brothers’ complaint, first reported by The Washington Post, drew international attention to the church’s financial interests and shocked many outsiders and members of the faith. The brothers argued that the church was violating tax laws by not spending more of this reserve on charitable purposes.

The church’s governing First Presidency — made up of church President Russell M. Nelson and his counselors, Dallin H. Oaks and Henry B. Eyring — rejected that allegation in a news release, saying the faith “complies with all applicable law governing our donations, investments, taxes and reserves.”

Other Latter-day Saint officials later said they didn’t previously disclose how big the financial reserve had grown because they didn’t want to discourage members from tithing, which is donating 10% of one’s income to the faith.

The church collects that tithing, which it uses to run its operations around the world, and it sends the excess to Ensign Peak Advisors to invest.

Church officials have called the fund a “rainy-day account” to help pay for operations in poorer parts of the world — such as Africa, where the faith is booming — and at some future time when member donations stagnate.

Mormon Church has misled members on $100 billion tax-exempt investment fund, whistleblower alleges

The Washington Post
By Jon Swaine, Douglas MacMillan and Michelle Boorstein
December 17, 2019 at 5:20 p.m. EST

A former investment manager alleges in a whistleblower complaint to the Internal Revenue Service that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has amassed about $100 billion in accounts intended for charitable purposes, according to a copy of the complaint obtained by The Washington Post.

The confidential document, received by the IRS on Nov. 21, accuses church leaders of misleading members — and possibly breaching federal tax rules — by stockpiling their surplus donations instead of using them for charitable works. It also accuses church leaders of using the tax-exempt donations to prop up a pair of businesses.

The church did not respond to detailed questions from The Post about the complaint and said in a statement Monday that it does not discuss specific financial transactions. On Tuesday, after the first version of this story was published, the church said it takes seriously its responsiblity to care for members’ donations.

“Claims being currently circulated are based on a narrow perspective and limited information,” said a statement attributed to the church’s First Presidency, its top governing body. “The Church complies with all applicable law governing our donations, investments, taxes, and reserves.”

The complaint provides a window into the closely held finances of one of the nation’s most visible religious organizations, based in Salt Lake City. It details a church fortune far exceeding past estimates and encompassing stocks, bonds and cash.

The complaint was filed by David A. Nielsen, a 41-year-old Mormon who worked until September as a senior portfolio manager at the church’s investment division, a company named Ensign Peak Advisors that is based near the church’s headquarters.

Nonprofit organizations, including religious groups, are exempted in the United States from paying taxes on their income. Ensign is registered with authorities as a supporting organization and integrated auxiliary of the Mormon Church. This permits it to operate as a nonprofit and to make money largely free from U.S. taxes.

The exemption requires that Ensign operate exclusively for religious, educational or other charitable purposes, a condition that Nielsen says the firm has not met.

In a declaration signed under penalty of perjury, Nielsen urges the IRS to strip the nonprofit of its tax-exempt status and alleges that Ensign could owe billions in taxes. He is seeking a reward from the IRS, which offers whistleblowers a cut of unpaid taxes that it recovers.

Nielsen did not respond to repeated phone calls and emails seeking comment.

His twin brother, Lars P. Nielsen, provided a copy of the complaint to The Post, along with dozens of supporting documents. Lars Nielsen, a health-care consultant in Minnesota, said he prepared the complaint with his brother and helped him submit it to the IRS.

Lars Nielsen said in a statement to The Post that his brother asked him to write an exposé on his former employer.

“Having seen tens of billions in contributions and scores more in investment returns come in, and having seen nothing except two unlawful distributions to for-profit concerns go out, he was dejected beyond words, and so was I,” Lars Nielsen wrote.

He said he was coming forward without his brother’s approval because he believed the information was too important to remain confidential. “I know that sometimes newspapers use anonymous sources,” he said. “But that is usually not best for a story.”

In remarks last year, a high-ranking cleric in the church, Bishop Gérald Caussé, said it “pays taxes on any income it derives from revenue-producing activities that are regularly carried on and are not substantially related to its tax-exempt purposes.”

The church typically collects about $7 billion each year in contributions from members, according to the complaint. Mormons, like members of some other faith groups, are asked to contribute 10 percent of their income to the church, a practice known as tithing.

While about $6 billion of that income is used to cover annual operating costs, the remaining $1 billion or so is transferred to Ensign, which plows some into an investment portfolio to generate returns, according to the complaint.

Based on internal accounting documents from February 2018, the complaint estimates the portfolio has grown in value from $12 billion in 1997, when Ensign was formed, to about $100 billion today.

The church also owns real estate worth billions of dollars, according to the complaint, which focuses on surplus tithing money and says that the church may have additional holdings not managed by Ensign.

While accumulating this wealth, Ensign has not directly funded any religious, educational or charitable activities in 22 years, the complaint said. No documents are provided to support this claim, which is attributed to information David Nielsen gleaned from working at the company.

Philip Hackney, a former IRS official who teaches tax law at the University of Pittsburgh, said the complaint raised a “legitimate concern” about whether the church’s investment arm deserved its tax-exempt status.

“If you have a charity that simply amasses a war chest year after year and does not spend any money for charity purposes, that does not meet the requirements of tax law,” Hackney said in an interview. Hackney, who served in the IRS chief counsel’s office, has been retained by The Post to analyze the whistleblower documents.

IRS rules dictate that a nonprofit organization must carry out charitable activity that is “commensurate in scope with its financial resources” to maintain its tax-exempt status. No threshold for this test is specified, and the agency instead considers examples case by case.

In its statement Tuesday, the church said the “vast majority” of the funds it receives from donations are “used immediately to meet the needs of the growing Church,” including temples, education and missionary work.

“Over many years, a portion is methodically safeguarded through wise financial management and the building of a prudent reserve for the future,” the statement said. “This is a sound doctrinal and financial principle taught by the Savior in the Parable of the Talents and lived by the Church and its members. All Church funds exist for no other reason than to support the Church’s divinely appointed mission.”

Details of the church’s expenditures on charitable work are not publicly available, but in a lecture at the University of Oxford in 2016, a senior elder said the church had spent about $40 million a year over the past 30 years on welfare, humanitarian aid and other international projects. He did not mention Ensign. The church said in a report last year that its charitable arm had spent $2.2 billion in assistance since 1985, but did not provide a breakdown on spending.

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While declining to discuss the extent of their holdings, church leaders have sought to explain the practice of continuing to collect tithes while accumulating financial reserves.

In a speech in March 2018, Caussé linked the church’s financial strategy to the “prophecies about the last days.” Just as the church maintains grain silos and emergency warehouses, Caussé said, so it “also methodically follows the practice of setting aside a portion of its revenues each year to prepare for any possible future needs.”

According to the complaint, Ensign’s president, Roger Clarke, has told others that the amassed funds would be used in the event of the second coming of Christ. Clarke did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Nielsen’s complaint is sharply critical of church leaders for continuing to ask for tithes, even from members who are struggling financially, while the church sits on a fortune. “Would you pay tithing instead of water, electricity, or feeding your family if you knew that it would sit around by the billions until the Second Coming of Christ?” he wrote in a 74-page narrative that accompanied his complaint.

He suggests church leaders favor continuing to collect tithes to avoid “losing control over their members’ behavior” by releasing them from their financial obligations. In June, the church raised the monthly charge paid by most families to cover the cost of their children serving as missionaries from $400 to $500 per month.

Leaders have consistently tried to downplay speculation about the extent of the church’s wealth. Quoting a former church president during the speech last year, Caussé, said: “When all is said and done, the only real wealth of the church is in the faith of its people.”

When interviewed by a German reporter in 2002 about suggestions that the church had amassed billions, then-President Gordon B. Hinckley said: “Yes, if you count all of our assets, yes, we are well-off. But those assets, you have to know this, are not money-producing. Those assets are money-consuming.”

Unlike other nonprofits, religious organizations are not required to publicly report their income or assets.

Nielsen’s estimate of Ensign’s assets places the Mormon investment organization among some of the country’s wealthiest companies and charities. Microsoft, Alphabet and Apple each hold between $100 billion and $136 billion in cash, according to the most recent company filings, while Harvard University has the country’s largest academic endowment at $40.9 billion. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest private philanthropic foundation in the world at $47.8 billion.

In addition to criticizing the scale of wealth accumulated by the church, Nielsen’s complaint accuses church leaders of acting improperly on the rare occasions that funds have been paid out from the investment division.

According to Nielsen, $2 billion from Ensign has been used over the past decade to bail out a church-run insurance company and a shopping mall in Salt Lake City that was a joint venture between the church and a major real estate company.

Citing an internal presentation that he includes as an exhibit, Nielsen alleges that in 2009, Ensign spent funds on rescuing the insurance firm, Beneficial Life, which was suffering from its exposure to mortgage-backed securities amid the financial crisis.

At the time, a church-owned newspaper reported that a different commercial church company, Deseret Management, had injected $594 million into Beneficial Life to make up its deficit. Mark Willes, Deseret Management’s president and chief executive, was reported to have said that no tithing money was used in the transaction.

Yet the internal presentation supplied to the IRS by Nielsen refers to a $600 million “withdrawal” from Ensign to Beneficial Life in 2009, citing a page from an Ensign slide presentation entitled “Framework and Exposures” and dated March 2013. Nielsen said the funds were taken specifically from the Ensign account that receives surplus tithing. Nielsen said the transfer was not treated as a loan and was not recorded as an investment on Ensign’s balance sheet.

Despite the bailout, Beneficial Life announced it would terminate 150 of its 214 Utah workers and stop writing new insurance policies.

Neither Willes nor an official from Beneficial Life responded to messages seeking comment.

Nielsen’s complaint further alleges that between 2009 and 2014, Ensign pumped $1.4 billion in several installments into the City Creek Center, a shopping mall in downtown Salt Lake City featuring a retractable roof. The mall, partly owned by the church, had also been hit by the financial crisis.

Amid complaints from members about the church venturing into retail, church leaders have repeatedly made assurances over several years that no money from tithes would be spent on developing the mall, a joint venture with the Taubman real estate group.

“I wish to give the entire church the assurance that tithing funds have not and will not be used to acquire this property. Nor will they be used in developing it for commercial purposes,” Hinckley said when plans for the mall were unveiled in 2003.

On Monday, the church told The Post that through its involvement in the City Creek mall, it had “increased local economic activity during a financial downturn and attracted visitors and residents to Salt Lake City’s historic downtown.”

A Taubman spokeswoman declined to comment.

Hackney, the University of Pittsburgh tax law expert, said the payments would raise red flags if they were indeed made to for-profit entities that were separate from Ensign and not recorded as investments.

While the church may argue Ensign contributes to a broader religious and charitable mission, as a separate corporate entity, it must show that “it furthers a charitable purpose exclusively on its own,” Hackney said.

“Once that money comes in, it’s gotta go back out,” he said. “They have to come up with a justification based on the entity alone. Looking at the other organizations shouldn’t be a means of justifying hoarding.”

IRS rules state that nonprofits “must not provide a substantial benefit to private interests” and that the earnings of registered religious organizations must not benefit “any private individual or shareholder” to avoid jeopardizing tax-exempt status.

The Mormon Church’s wealth and investment acumen has been widely reported. A Time magazine cover story, “Mormons, Inc.,” published in 1997, estimated the church’s total assets at $30 billion or more. A 2012 Reuters article reported that the church owned “about $35 billion worth of temples and meeting houses around the world, and controls farms, ranches, shopping malls and other commercial ventures worth many billions more.”

Nielsen’s complaint comes as many Mormons across the United States are engaged in discussions with their bishops, traditionally held in December, to “settle” their dues to the church. His estimate of $7 billion in annual revenue points to a relatively high rate of contributions from the 15 million members. By comparison, the Catholic church in the United States was reported in 2005 to receive $8 billion in annual tithes. There were 75 million Catholics in the U.S. in 2010, according to Pew Research Center.

The complaint filed by Nielsen comprised a signed Form 211, the formal piece of IRS paperwork for reporting tax avoidance, a notarized cover letter to officials, plus the 74-page narrative document co-written with his brother in which he detailed his allegations at length.

These documents were sent to the IRS whistleblower office in Ogden, Utah, together with a thumb drive containing digital versions of documents and emails that Nielsen collected during his time at Ensign, the complaint says. He also provided information on Ensign’s bank accounts and a list of employees whom officials should contact.

Nielsen told Ensign in a resignation letter dated Aug. 29 that his employment had become unworkable after his wife and children left the Mormon Church and asked him to follow them, according to a copy of the letter provided by Lars Nielsen. David Nielsen offered to continue working until Oct. 4.

Ensign’s human resources director told him in a reply that managers had decided it would be best to terminate his employment Sept. 3.

“We appreciate your years of service and the contributions you have made for the church,” the letter concluded.

The complaint describes an aggressive guarding of information by leaders at Ensign. Ensign employees “are trained to be especially sensitive” about data flowing outside the corporation, the complaint states. “Of course, all corporations need to guard their information, but the lengths that [Ensign] goes to borders on paranoia.”

Only four senior Ensign executives are permitted to see the company’s full financial statements, according to the complaint, and investment staff members may access information only on the Ensign assets relating to their own area of work.

Little has been publicly disclosed by Ensign, whose website address redirects readers to the church’s homepage.

The company files abbreviated annual tax returns that report the taxes it paid on the small fraction of its investment activity that is taxable. The returns, which are publicly available, show that in some recent years, the company has reported losses of millions of dollars — a period in which, according to the complaint, a fuller accounting of its operations would have shown billions of dollars in profits.

This limited type of tax return requires Ensign to disclose the total value of its holdings, which the complaint asserts, has for years run to tens of billions of dollars. On those returns, Ensign has sometimes stated that it held $1 million, other times “more than $1,000,000,” and it once left this section of the paperwork unfilled.

During his 2002 interview with a German reporter, Hinckley was told that several major denominations in Germany published records of their finances. Why not the Mormons?

“We simply think that information belongs to those who made the contribution, and not to the world,” said Hinckley, who died in 2008.

The diaries of the late LDS Church Apostle, Abraham H. Cannon, stretching from 1889 to the end of 1895, is interesting church history reading. Signature Book’s “Candid Insights of a Mormon Apostle,” edited by scholar Edward Leo Lyman, provides readers glimpses into the wary, sometimes turbulent LDS history between the Manifesto against polygamy, the church’s desperate efforts to avoid financial destruction due to polygamy, the dedication of the Salt Lake temple, the financial panic of 1893, and efforts toward statehood for Utah.

Cannon, who had several wives, died in 1896 at age 37 from complications of an ear infection. The scion of a prominent Mormon family — his father, George Q. Cannon, was a fellow apostle — his diaries show how his high standing in the LDS Church encompassed not only religious duties, but high-stakes business, chicanery and politics. A thorough diarist, regular meetings of the church’s First Presidency and Quorum of the 12 Apostles are meticulously recorded. Governing the young church’s business empire and dealing with the real threat of imprisonment and government harassment due to polygamy occupied as much time — if not more — than religious duties. Example: Cannon’s diary entry of Dec. 17, 1892, records that at the apostles’ meeting “… the brethren were told that our success in the Church suits was in a great measure due to the fact that we have a partner of Justice {Stephen J.} Field of the Supreme Court of the United States in our employ, who is to receive a percentage of the money if the suits go in our favor, and the property is returned to us. …”Given the times, this is not as shocking as it sounds today. Justice Field was not the only person of influence tempted by the church. President Benjamin Harrison’s secretary was helping the church. The diaries reveal how federal attorneys were routinely bribed through third parties. Church leaders spent considerable energies covering up the crime of an embezzler because that man — sympathetic to the church — was in a position to be a receiver of assets the church needed. In fact, Cannon records entries where the apostles were counseled to “keep secrets” from their enemies.

But even with the help of a high court justice, Cannon’s entries detail how the church was boxed in politically and in danger of financial ruin due to overall public disgust of polygamy. The Manifesto from President Woodruff against polygamy was originally intended to grandfather in current polygamous relationships, but Cannon’s diaries detail how political powers forced the LDS prophet to make later, tougher statements that forbid already-married polygamists from co-habitating. Apostles, including Cannon, were constantly threatened with imprisonment if they even visited their plural wives.

Cannon details how busy the life of an LDS apostle was. Although most details of his family life were omitted by Signature’s editors, Cannon was constantly taking trains up and down the state, speaking at stake conferences, settling church feuds, selecting new bishops and stake presidents. Cannon must have given hundreds of church-related talks a year. As is today, the LDS priesthood hierarchy was stressed. Leaders, from apostles downward, were urged to change their opinions if a superior took an opposing stance. Cannon also describes, in detail, prayer circles and the rarely-mentioned second anointing, where church leaders and spouses are guaranteed exaltation, or the highest level of the Celestial Kingdom. Cannon himself received a second anointing.

Politics was often discussed and apostles were assigned to research and lobby for or against legislation. Cannon’s disgust for the anti-Mormon Liberal Party is not shy. The First Presidency and Apostles engaged in serious efforts to control local press coverage and counter the Tribune. Pages of the diaries recount local campaigns. Eventually, Cannon became part owner of the LDS-friendly Deseret News. Politics at times would tear the apostles’ unity, particularly when the Democrats and Republicans set up parties in Utah. Apostle Moses Thatcher, a Democrat, would often quarrel with apostle, John Henry Smith, a Republican.

Cannon details special meetings of the quorum where the apostles would speak frankly about their feelings for each other and address cases of gratitude and their struggles against resentment. The reader catches the religious spirit and commitment that bonded these men. These are fascinating, partially because even today, the LDS Church leadership is silent on the spirit and topics of the meetings of its hierarchy. A key difference from today’s LDS leadership is that the church’s highest officials — 120 years ago — were more likely to go out politicking. Today, church politics is more subtle. Preaching was far more conservative: Apostle John Henry Smith is recounted warning members that sexual intercourse for any purpose other than bearing children is the same as adultery, according to the Lord.

Glimpses of a high-level meeting are very interesting for history buffs. In one apostles’ session, Cannon recounts a debate over the Adam-God doctrine. The apostles disagree, but Cannon believes Adam must be more than just a spiritual brother. In another, the apostles discuss the status of the Holy Ghost — is he a son of God, only without a body? There was a discussion of whether there were “daughters of perdition.” The apostles also stressed the LDS doctrine that faithful parents would be assured of the salvation of their wayward children. The bohemian atmosphere of the early LDS church still remained. President Woodruff and the apostles freely discussed visions, conversations with the slain Mormon leader Joseph Smith and even a glimpse of the modern-day Cain was described.

Cannon was often without enough money to keep his many businesses healthy. He was a good businessman but had his hands in too many endeavors, although near the end of his life, his efforts in a railroad were paying off. Much of the 1893 entries involve his desperate attempts to meet payrolls and keep a bank he co-owned afloat during that year’s financial panic. In one instance, Cannon, after becoming a partner in a mine, promised the Lord a fifth of his profits if the mine was successful.

Ogden is mentioned often — Cannon frequently spoke there — as is the Standard-Examiner a few times. Much of the diaries cover mundane, administrative tasks that will interest history buffs. One tidbit of interest: church leaders, including President Woodruff, were fans of horse racing in Salt Lake City.

Cannon lived in Salt Lake City, on the northwest corner of 900 South on 800 West. His diaries may be uncomfortably candid, but they can also inspire LDS readers today who want more than Pablum. We are in Cannon’s debt for leaving records that bring to life an era in the Top of Utah usually recollected in dry history texts.

Mormon Church seeks to be 'more proactive' in green-building efforts with City Creek

As the towers of the Mormon Church's City Creek Center continue to rise, construction workers are using rebar made from recycled steel.

It's part of City Creek Reserve Inc.'s goal to recycle half of the steel from the old Crossroads and ZCMI Center malls as officials target an LEED silver certification for the massive downtown development.

"The best lesson we've learned is, at the end of the day, it's probably not very much — or any — more expensive," said Bishop H. David Burton, presiding bishop of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In briefing the Salt Lake City Council on the project's progress, Bishop Burton said "good planning" and recycled materials have helped keep the project under budget. Officials have not disclosed the cost of the project, though some have estimated the LDS Church will spend as much as $3 billion by the time the center opens in 2012.

The green building efforts happening at City Creek Center often are overlooked, said Councilman S?ren Simonsen. It is part of a message Simonsen said he hopes church leaders might help spread as they help redevelop downtown.

"It's a very important message," the councilman said. "It's a message that's not always connecting with the masses."

Bishop Burton acknowledged the need for "good stewardship" and said the LDS Church had just recently begun experimenting with "solar meetinghouses." Three such buildings, which would depend primarily on solar power, are under construction, he said.

"In the things we advertise and the things we promote, we could probably be more proactive in that arena," Bishop Burton said. "It's a great story, and we ought to probably promote it more."

City Creek Reserve, a development arm of the LDS Church, also will recycle much of the concrete from the demolished malls, officials said.

Improved restroom fixtures and lighting also will be important pieces in the push to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design accreditation.

Water fight pits Mormons against St. Johns district

Church wants cities to pay

BY JIM WAYMER • FLORIDA TODAY • August 4, 2009

A legal fight over whether Central Florida utilities must pay Deseret Ranches millions of dollars in fees for drinking water from Taylor Creek Reservoir could stall plans to tap the manmade lake to fuel growth and ease stress on groundwater, wetlands and springs.

Five public utilities, including Cocoa and Titusville, and Deseret itself want 25 million to 40 million daily gallons by 2015 from the 10,000-acre body of water that straddles Orange and Osceola counties.

But the 450-square-mile ranch, run by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, wants the other utilities to pay for the water.

The St. Johns River Water Management District asserts the water is a public resource and that it has rights under easements the ranch granted during a government flood-control project in the late 1960s. It has filed a lawsuit.

"Now (the Mormon church is) contending that that reservoir, which was constructed with public money, can only be used for agricultural water supply," said Stanley Niego, an attorney for the district.

The utilities have been in discussions with Deseret for years about building a treatment plant to pull more water from the reservoir and the St. Johns River, which feeds it. Deseret's demand makes cities vying for drinking water unsure what it will cost.

Deseret officials referred questions to their Orlando attorney, Scott Johnson.

"This lawsuit seeks something for nothing," he said via e-mail. "Deseret Ranch was paid nothing for the flowage and storage water rights it transferred in the late 1960s, and those rights made no mention of water storage for public consumption. The arrangement with the City of Cocoa implicitly recognizes this."

Johnson said it's "too early to say what should be paid and by whom, however, we were engaged in a process to arrive at those answers by mutual agreement when this litigation was initiated. We will now allow the court process to play its role," he said.

Cocoa pays about $430,000 per year under a 1993 agreement with the ranch that includes easements and access to the reservoir. But it does not pay for the water it draws.

In addition to Cocoa and Titusville, the public utilities that want the additional drinking water are Orlando Utilities Commission, Orange County and Toho Water Authority in Kissimmee.

Suit filed

The St. Johns district filed the suit against Deseret's investment arm, Farmland Reserve Inc. of Salt Lake City, in the Ninth Judicial Circuit in Orange County.

The district wants a judge to clarify that it has the right to flow and store water in Taylor Creek Reservoir, which sits on Deseret's land, for public drinking water. The district is suing to bring more certainty for the utilities involved in the project, which the district has nudged for years to use more of the St. Johns instead of more groundwater.

Construction of the reservoir began in 1966 and was finished in 1969.

The district says public utilities shouldn't have to pay for water that wouldn't be there were it not for the government project and levee that harnesses the water.

Deseret also makes money from the reservoir through leases to fishing clubs.

In 1992, Cocoa obtained a permit from the water management district to withdraw a yearly average of 8.83 million gallons a day from the reservoir. The city has used the reservoir since 1999.

Cocoa City Attorney Anthony Garganese said it's unclear whether the district's lawsuit would have any effect on the city's long-term water plans.

"Right now we're just not a party, and just kind of watching what's going on," he said. "The city has no plans to intervene in that lawsuit."

Demand rises

Some wellfields in Cocoa, Palm Bay and Titusville could run out of clean, cheap groundwater by 2030 if the region fails to switch to other sources such as Taylor Creek.

According to district study released earlier this year, at least nine public drinking wells in Brevard grow saltier every year at "critical" rates.

Officials say more water from the St. Johns River, via the Taylor Creek Reservoir, should help spare the region's wells from further contamination from saltwater and other environmental harm from overdraws of groundwater. But they also say a more spartan water ethic may be key to guarding the region's groundwater supply.

The reservoir expansion would be from 10 million to 25 million to 40 million daily gallons by 2015 at an estimated cost ranging from $133 million to $215 million. It has been in the works for years.

"I'm sure there'll be an appeal no matter who wins, so I'm going to say it's going to take one to two years (to resolve)," Niego, the district's attorney, said.

In addition to Cocoa and Titusville, the public utilities that want the additional drinking water are Orlando Utilities Commission, Orange County and Toho Water Authority in Kissimmee.

Mormon church president names new apostle

By JENNIFER DOBNER, Associated Press Writer
April 6, 2009

Elder Neil L. Andersen, left, the newly named apostle of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, takes his spot on the stand next to Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles at the General Conference of the Mormon church in Salt Lake City on Saturday.

SALT LAKE CITY - Mormon church president Thomas S. Monson has named Neil L. Andersen to the church's Quorum of Twelve Apostles.

Andersen, 57, replaces Joseph B. Wirthlin, who died in December at age 91. The quorum is the second-highest governing body of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Its members serve for life and are in line to ascend to become president of the church.

The appointment is Monson's second since he was named the 16th president of the church last year. Monson made the announcement during the opening session of the two-day annual spring conference.

Andersen has most recently served the church as the senior member of the Presidency of the Seventy, which oversees administrative affairs for the church worldwide.

Anderson also supervised church activity in southern Brazil and in western Europe. He has also been the executive director of the church's audiovisual department. A native of Logan, Utah, Andersen was raised on a dairy farm in Pocatello, Idaho. He is a graduate of the church-owned Brigham Young University and holds a master's degree in business from Harvard University. In his professional life outside the church, Andersen worked in advertising, real estate development and the health care industry.

At a news conference, Andersen said he was "humbled by the day and very overwhelmed at what is ahead of me." Andersen said he was asked by Monson to join the quorum on Wednesday, and hasn't slept much since.

"Those of us who are members of the church, throughout our lives we receive callings that are unexpected, we're shocked and we don't quite know how to react to them," Andersen said. "Those have happened to me multiple times ... but I must say, in this case, it is far more daunting."

As a church administrator Andersen has a unique understanding of how the church is developing around the world and the challenges that brings. New statistics released Saturday show worldwide church membership has grown to 13.5 million. The data, which is current through Dec. 31, 2008, shows a missionary effort of more than 52,000 drew 265,593 converts last year. Most of the growth is occurring outside the United States.

Andersen says the church's governing bodies are increasingly diverse and reflect the growth.

"The nature of the governance of the church is expanding as the needs are expanding," he said. "The main challenges of course are to remain righteous in a secular society, to be obedient to our Heavenly Father's commandments and to help with the governance of the church as it grows across to nations we hardly know the name of at this time."

Mormons gather in April and October to hear from church leaders. The event draws tens of thousands to the faith's four-block downtown Salt Lake City campus, with 21,000 packing each of five devotional sessions designed to explain church doctrine, provide inspiration and guide family life. The proceedings are also broadcast worldwide by satellite, closed circuit television and over the Internet.

On Saturday, Mormon leaders addressed the nation's economic crisis, cautioning members against behaviors that lead to excessive debt or addictions to food, drugs and alcohol, or to patterns that diminish self-worth and undermine family relationships.

"Our challenges, including those we create by our own decisions are part of our test in mortality," church elder Robert D. Hales said. "We must practice the principles of provident living: Joyfully living within our means, being content with what we have, avoiding excessive debt and diligently saving and preparing for rainy day emergencies."

13.5 million Mormons

A statistical report of the growth and status of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as of Dec. 31, 2008, released Saturday during the faith's annual spring conference:

Church Units - 2,818 stakes (similar to dioceses), 348 missions, 622 districts, 28,109 wards and branches (congregations)

Church Membership - 13,508,509; members increased by 123,502 children of record and 265,593 baptized converts during 2008.

Full-time missionaries - 52,494

Temples - 128 in 2008

- Associated Press

Mormon church restructures business arm

March 6, 2009

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is revamping its business arm, the Deseret Management Corp., a holding company for commercial enterprises ranging from restaurants at Temple Square to real estate across the country.

Executives say Deseret Management Corp. will become an active operating company that takes more control of its seven subsidiaries.

Deseret Management's new president and CEO, Mark H. Willes, will become chairman of the board of each subsidiary, with their CEOs reporting directly to him rather than their own boards.

Willes is a former General Mills Inc. executive who was chief of Times Mirror Co. and later publisher of its Los Angeles Times before taking over Deseret Management last month.

LAS VEGAS The water agency serving Las Vegas says it's struck a seven-point-two (M) Million dollar deal to use water rights the Mormon church owns at a ranch in southern Nevada.

The Southern Nevada Water Authority says the 20-year lease with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will let Las Vegas draw about two-thousand acre-feet per year from the flow of the Muddy River -- or enough to serve some about four-thousand homes. There's an option to extend the deal for up to 20 additional years.

The church got the water rights when it bought Warm Springs Ranch in 1978. The land about 60 miles northeast of Las Vegas was once owned by Howard Hughes.

The authority intends to draw the water from Lake Mead so it'll have to get approval from the federal Interior Department.

The Salt Lake City-based church isn't commenting on the deal. But a church spokeswoman says the church has lots of ranches and farms.

Mormon church seeks delay in Nevada water plan

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - The Mormon church says groundwater should not be pumped from Nevada's Spring Valley area to Las Vegas until it is determined that will not harm the church and other water-rights holders.

Church attorneys have asked the Nevada state engineer to delay awarding a permit to the Southern Nevada Water Authority until a U.S. Geological Survey study of the region's groundwater resources is completed next year.

The plan is part of the water authority's larger "Clark, Lincoln and White Pine Counties Groundwater Development Project," which would pipe about 200,000 acre-feet of water per year from seven hydrologic basins, including Spring Valley, with most going to the Las Vegas area.

Another piece of the project is in Snake Valley, which straddles the Utah border.

Ranchers on both sides of the Utah-Nevada line and environmental groups have opposed the project, fearing it will dry up water tables and destroy the area's ecosystem and ranching industry.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints owns the Cleveland-Rogers Ranch in White Pine County.

The church "does not object to the proposed development of water to the extent that the hydrological information available ... shows a reasonable likelihood that there is unappropriated water available for such a development," church attorney Bruce Findlay wrote in an Aug. 4 letter to Nevada engineer Tracy Taylor.

However, he said the church has concerns about the impact on other water-rights holders "if the sources proposed for the development will draw upon sources that are already appropriated."

Findlay said several areas identified by the Southern Nevada Water Authority for diversion are near the water sources of the Cleveland-Rogers Ranch, potentially raising concerns about interference with the ranch's senior rights to the water.

While the church is asking for a slowdown of approval for the project, Utah and Nevada officials have been moving ahead to finalize a water sharing agreement that would cover the large aquifer that sits under the state line.

The two states are conducting groundwater testing in the area. But the agreement would precede both the USGS study and an ongoing environmental impact study being done by the Bureau of Land Management.

Last month, Pat Mulroy, general manager of the water authority, said the USGS study will not settle the question of how much water sits below the Snake Valley, or how taking 25,000 acre-feet a year out will impact the resource.

She said the only way to determine that is to start withdrawing water and make adjustments as impacts present themselves.

The 4,000-acre Cleveland-Rogers Ranch is part of the church's Welfare Services Department. The church said it provides assistance to the poor through growing crops and raising cattle that are used to provide food for the needy.

The church's Corporation of the Presiding Bishop owns surface and groundwater rights in the Spring Valley area for watering about 1,500 cows and calves.

The Nevada state engineer's office said a hearing on the project will be held Sept. 11 in Carson City.

Mormons make $2.9M offer for Boy Scouts’ land

KINGSTON, N.H.— The Mormon church has expressed interest in purchasing the 125-acre Lone Tree Reservation Boy Scout Camp for $2.9 million, a move that would allow the church to establish a permanent girls camp at the location.

“The Mormon church has made it very clear that they intend to buy a property in Southern New Hampshire for a girls camp,” said Randy Larson, an executive for the Yankee Clipper Council, the Boy Scout organization that owns the camp.

The proposal, which is not yet a formal offer, would allow Boy Scouts to use the camp for two weeks each summer and on weekends throughout the year.

Larson said the Yankee Clipper Council has received offers to purchase its properties in the recent past, although it has not pursued them. The council owns three camps — in Raymond, Northwood and Kingston — and two office buildings in Massachusetts, one in Haverhill and one in Middleton.

While Larson said the council does not face undue financial pressure to sell the property — the organization has had a balanced budget for the past two years — he did say that many nonprofit organizations have found it increasingly difficult to meet budgetary needs.

“Finances are tight. It’s tough out there right now,” he said. “It’s not easy right now for organizations, or businesses for that matter.”

Beyond that, he said, the offer of $2.9 million is reasonable for the property in question.

In a recent press release, the Yankee Clipper Council wrote that the price was “the highest and best use appraised value for the property, according to an independent appraisal authorized by (the council) and conducted earlier this year.”

Larson said the inquiry, and the $2.9 million figure, came directly from the Mormon church’s central office in Salt Lake City.

The church, known formally as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is a major supporter of the Boy Scouts of America at the national level. In December 2005, nearly 400,000 of the 2.9 million youths enrolled in Boy Scouts, or about 13.5 percent, were members of the Mormon church, according to information provided by the church.

And the relationship between the two organizations dates back to 1911, only a year after Boy Scouts of America was formed, according to church documents.

The Mormon church has 8,088 members in New Hampshire, spread throughout 19 congregations, according to the church.
In Kingston, Larson said, the church rents the Lone Tree camp periodically for the church’s girls camping programs.

“The Mormon church has rented it from us,” he said. “That’s probably one reason why they’ve inquired (about the property).”
The Yankee Clipper Council — with its 8,600 children and 4,000 adult leaders in 52 Massachusetts and New Hampshire communities — isn’t the only nonprofit organization to consider selling properties in recent years.

The Spar and Spindle Council Inc., a Girl Scouts of America group based in North Andover, Mass., is in the process of selling 10 house lots from a 300-acre camp in Pelham to a real estate developer.

“It’s just a hard time for not-for-profits,” said Judy Wise, Spar and Spindle’s chief executive officer. “I think the economy is a big piece of it. Donations are slim for us.”

Wise’s organization owns five camps, as well as one office building. She said she hopes the sale of the 10 house lots — each roughly one acre in size — will allow Spar and Spindle to maintain the rest of its properties for some time to come.
But the decision to move forward with the sale was a difficult one, she said.

“It’s not something that you do lightly,” Wise said. “It’s not something that you want to do, but sometimes it’s in the best interests of your organization.”

The YWCA of Newburyport, Mass., is in the process of selling its camp in Kingston, called Blue Triangle, according to YWCA staff member Rebecca Berard.

The Yankee Clipper Council has formed an ad hoc committee to study the possible sale of the camp, and Larson said the members are welcoming comments and suggestions from members of the public and the Boy Scout community.

Whatever the Boy Scout group decides to do, financial considerations will play a key role in the decision, Larson said.
“We have to watch every dollar. The ninth point of the Scout law is thrifty,” he said.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has filed suit accusing the University of Phoenix of discriminating against non-Mormon employees.

The legal action, filed this week in U.S. District Court in Phoenix, alleges the employment conditions at the private college were less favorable for these workers in regard to enrollment leads, tuition waiver grants and reprimands. In addition, three non-LDS employees in Arizona were transferred and one was fired in retaliation for complaining, according to the suit.

The lawsuit is seeking an injunction barring the university from discriminating based on religion and from retaliating based on complaints about unlawful practices; the institution of policies to provide equal employment opportunities for non-members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; a written apology; financial compensation and reinstatement for the affected employees; and unspecified punitive damages.

University spokesman Joe Cockrell said the school has not yet been served with the suit so he cannot comment on the specifics.

"We employ over 15,000 people and we have always been guided by the principle of equal opportunity and respect for others," he said.

"We are committed to the principles of tolerance and respect, fair treatment, equal access and consideration, and recognition for contributions. We maintain a strict anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policy and take a zero-tolerance stance on these issues." The university, part of the Phoenix-based Apollo Group, caters to working adults. According to its Web site, the school has more than 200,000 students enrolled on campuses and online. The Utah campuses are in Salt Lake City, Taylorsville, Murray, Ogden, Provo and St. George.

PORTLAND, Ore. -- The Oregon Supreme Court rejected an effort by the Mormon church to withhold financial information from the lawyers for a man who claims a "home teacher" frequently molested him about 20 years ago.

Despite the legal defeat, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints did not immediately release the detailed financial information about its net worth, The Oregonian newspaper reported.

Kelly Clark, an attorney for the Oregon man suing the church, said it would be good for a jury to have the information before considering his request for $45 million in punitive damages. A trial is scheduled for Aug. 6.

"A jury needs to know the entire financial context to know whether a punitive award is too much or sufficient or not enough," Clark said.

The LDS church sought emergency relief from a trial court order to turn over the financial information, but the Oregon Supreme Court late Monday rejected the appeal. The pretrial decision was reached on narrow pretrial grounds and doesn't mean the court would not ultimately side with the church's position that the Constitution protects its right to keep financial information private.

"The church is considering its position," Stephen F. English, the LDS church's lead Portland attorney, told the newspaper. "The church respects the rule of law but has profound constitutional concerns based on its constitutional right to protect the free expression of its religion."

"It's the secret of secrets," said Timothy N. Kosnoff, a Seattle attorney who sought the information in 2001 on behalf of a former Oregon man who claimed he was sexually abused by an LDS Sunday school teacher.

Kosnoff never got the information because the church agreed to pay his client $3 million.

The latest bid to expose the church's net worth stems from a lawsuit filed last year that accuses Kenneth I. Johnson Jr. of molesting a Beaverton youth as often as twice a week in the late 1980s.

Johnson, who has denied the accusation, was the boy's home teacher, a church-sanctioned lay official authorized to provide educational and religious guidance, according to the suit.

English said Johnson was acting as a family friend, not a church official, and LDS church officials did not know about the alleged abuse while it was happening.

MEDIA ADVISORY, Jan. 11 /Christian Newswire/ -- On December 12th, 2007, the very same day that Romney indicated his support of the Federal ENDA legislation, news of his investment company's buyout of Clear Channel Communications surfaced. Clear Channel owns Rush Limbaugh's and Sean Hannity's contracts, and is the largest conservative radio conglomerate in the country. It may be no small coincidence that conservative talk show hosts lambasted Christian Mike Huckabee as a liberal just mere hours before he took the Iowa Caucus.

Romney is no media novice. For years he has supported the Mormon media blitz of television and radio spots that have slowly brainwashed so many of us into believing that Mormons are Christians too. Today in the national political debate, to ask questions about the Mormon "jesus" is labeled religious bigotry- hate speech that must be silenced.

Romney is said to be worth at least a quarter of a billion dollars, and has given every indication that he intends to buy the presidency, sparing no expense. If voted into office, it would be the first time ever in American history that a president would control so much wealth, as well as so much of the media.

Christians in America need to begin asking questions.

Is it really the right thing for America to make a man as powerful and rich as Romney president?

Is America in the position to take such a risk at such a crucial moment in our history?

Are we really ready to turn our nation over to an untested man that has served only one term as governor of liberal Massachusetts?

Can Romney really be trusted when he says he is opposed to abortion, does not support gay marriage or civil unions, and is ready to solve our illegal immigration crisis, even as he's waffled on all these issues?

Are we really so naïve to think that a man of such vast wealth did not build his portfolio standing on the back of the working man?

Is it really wise to vote for a man when in our gut we know for certain that something just isn't right about him?

Rev. C.J. Conner is the author of Jesus and the Culture Wars: Reclaiming the Lord's Prayer.

The behind-the-scenes drama of the Utah-made movie "Church Ball" may play out in a different court.

Utah financier Bryan Lampropoulos is suing Provo-based Halestorm Entertainment, CEO David Hunter and other executives, for at least $6 million dollars plus punitive damages - claiming Halestorm overspent in making the 2006 comedy and never repaid Lampropoulos for his investment.

The lawsuit, filed Nov. 19 in Fourth Judicial District Court in Provo, details how Lampropoulos created an investment firm, Joshua Bryan & Co., to provide funds for two Halestorm movies, "The Home Teachers" and "Church Ball." JB&C and Halestorm created a joint venture partnership, Three Rivers Movies LLC, to finance and produce the films. (Three Rivers is also a defendant in the lawsuit.)

The partnership went well with "The Home Teachers," the lawsuit says. The 2004 comedy was made for about $430,000, approximately within budget, and marketing costs were on a par with Halestorm's previous Mormon-themed hits, "The Singles Ward" and "The R.M." The movie even featured a cameo by Lampropoulos' father, Merit Medical chairman and former Utah gubernatorial candidate Fred Lampropoulos.

But the relationship soured during the making of "Church Ball." The lawsuit alleges that Halestorm requested a bigger budget so the filmmakers could hire recognizable actors, eventually pushing the production costs to $1.2 million. The actors hired included comedian Fred Willard, character actor Clint Howard (brother of Ron Howard), former child star Gary Coleman, and Andrew Wilson (brother of Luke and Owen Wilson).

Bryan Lampropoulos never approved the larger budget in advance, the lawsuit claims, but paid the extra money to keep the production from folding. The suit also claims Halestorm ran up unnecessary expenses during filming of "Church Ball," including motor homes for the actors, 24-hour catering and "buy[ing] controlled substances for one or more of the actors."

Halestorm, the lawsuit alleges, also broke their agreement not to work on other movies until "Church Ball" was completed. By releasing other Mormon-themed movies, such as "Mobsters and Mormons" and "Sons of Provo," the suit reads, Halestorm's executives "failed to use their 'best efforts' toward creating a quality film and also diluted the Mormon movie genre."

According to the lawsuit, Lampropoulos' JB&C recovered about $450,000 back from the ticket and DVD sales of "The Home Teachers," but nothing from "Church Ball's" ticket sales, DVDs or spin-off products (including a "Church Ball" board game). The suit also accuses Halestorm executives of forming companies to hide the assets from "Church Ball."

An Ogden man whose Mormon religion helped him win the trust of investors is going to prison for a fraud scheme that exceeded $140 million.

Val Southwick was sentenced Thursday to one year to 15 years in prison for each of the nine counts of securities fraud. The punishments are to be served consecutively.

It will be up to the Utah parole board to determine just how long Southwick, 63, is locked up. Third District Judge Robin Reese also ordered him to make full restitution.

The scheme is described as one of the largest Ponzi operations in Utah history, lasting more than 17 years and involving more than 800 people. Southwick promised huge returns on commercial real estate through his Ogden-based company, VesCor, or its 150 subsidiaries.

In a Ponzi scheme, money from investors is recycled to pay off other investors. Southwick said he's remorseful and "deeply saddened by my failure to make the investors whole."

Southwick used money to pay for a mortgage, massages, vacations, medical and legal expenses, a large collection of cars and church tithing. He stopped paying investors in 2006 and claims to have been working to recoup their losses ever since.

"Your honor, it was never my intention to hurt or cause harm to any investors," Southwick told the judge. "Maybe I was naive to think that somehow I could work through this difficult process and pay all investors back."

More than a dozen victims spoke in court, some on behalf of family members who had lost their life savings.

Among them was Ogden Mayor Matthew Godfrey, who urged the judge to keep Southwick out of prison.

Godfrey said Southwick wasn't an "evil man" and his incarceration could bump violent criminals from beds in Utah's overcrowded prison.

"Allow him to serve his time working to pay back investors," Godfrey said, drawing jeers from the packed courtroom.

Most said they wanted Southwick to serve the maximum prison term. They called him a predatory, selfish person who likely can't be reformed.

Many said the stress of losses had left them emotionally devastated and physically ill. Some said they were facing bankruptcy or home foreclosure.

"The whole thing is tragic," Melissa VanBlankenstein of Walnut, Calif., said after the hearing. "It's tragic for us and it's tragic for him, but he deserves to be punished."

VanBlakenstein is hopeful that she and her husband will recover nearly $200,000.

"I believe he has assets somewhere," she said of Southwick. "How could anybody lose that much money?"

Southwick is facing a civil lawsuit in federal court brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission. The court has appointed a receiver to identify assets that can be used to compensate victims.

On Saturday, auctioneers plan to sell the contents of VesCor's offices as a way to raise money for victims. Among the items boxed and tagged: four inscribed Spanish swords and a set of bronzed Book of Mormon Golden Plates bookends.

Southwick asked for 30 days to report to prison, but the judge immediately placed him in custody.