Clarksville, Tennessee, Salvation Army advisory board members step down, call for change

Nine of the eleven members of the advisory committee for the Clarksville Salvation Army stepped down last week, following controversy at the charitable organization. The committee focuses on fundraising for the local Salvation Army.

Robert Burchett, a former member of the committee, said the nine members resigned to make a statement to the Salvation Army’s main office. “We felt like we needed to do something,” Burchett said. “It was just almost like the last straw.”

Burchett said that since he joined the committee more than six years ago, three former commanding officers had either resigned or been fired following different levels of controversy. The most recent commanding officer, Jimmy Steele, was fired by the Salvation Army after allegations that he sold Kroger gift cards intended to help families in need on Ebay. The investigation into Steele’s alleged misconduct is still ongoing. Burchett said the controversy would be harmful to the organization’s work in Clarksville, saying, “It’s going to be really hard to fundraise for them here in Clarksville because so many people know what’s happened.” Handling donated funds honestly, especially money meant for the needy, is a matter of integrity (Proverbs 11:1).

The members who stepped down sent a letter to the Salvation Army office in Nashville asking the group to hand over the keys to the Clarksville facility so that another charity could come in and serve the people of Clarksville “with a clean slate.” Burchett said, “Since what’s happened, I believe we could bring another group in and it would do the most good.”

Members of the Salvation Army’s headquarters in Nashville responded that the organization is bringing in a couple from Bowling Green, Kentucky, to take over the Clarksville facility. The headquarters said it hopes they can restore the Clarksville Salvation Army to its original purpose.

Source: Read the original report