Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 21, 1995 TAG: 9507140088
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: THE WASHINGTON POST
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
``I'm not here to destroy the AARP,'' Simpson said at a Senate hearing. ``But I am here to get rid of hypocrisy and duplicity.''
AARP officials said the hearing, which Simpson billed as an examination of its business and financial practices, was driven by Simpson's political differences with the association over funding for Medicare.
The AARP took in $173.3 million last year by helping businesses sell its members products such as health, life, automobile and mobile-home insurance; mutual funds; and prescription drugs - and received another $86.4 million in federal grants. Simpson argued that the AARP should not also receive tax-exempt status, and he said the group's activities raise questions about the government's tax treatment of nonprofit groups in general.
Simpson, chairman of the Senate subcommittee on social security and family policy, said he was likely to introduce legislation that would require nonprofit social welfare groups to receive a minimum percentage of their revenues from membership dues in an effort to make them more accountable to their members. He said he also was likely to propose restrictions on lobbying by social welfare groups that receive federal funds.
Simpson also said the AARP showed ``blatant disregard for the law'' in 1992 when it continued to mail insurance solicitations at nonprofit rates for almost six months after the U.S. Postal Service had directed it to stop.
AARP Executive Director Horace B. Deets said the organization at the time was still in a debate with the Postal Service over ``the validity of the regulation'' prohibiting the use of the discounted rate. The Postal Service later asserted that the AARP owed it $5.6 million for mailings sent at nonprofit rates, and the AARP settled by paying $2.8 million, according to AARP officials.
by CNB