Feeding Our Future: behind the blue door
Local media are digging into the newest Feeding Our Future scandal, the nonprofit New Vision Foundation of St. Paul. What went on behind the blue door?
Keep in mind that neither the nonprofit nor anyone associated with it have been charged with any wrongdoing.
Last week, FBI agents executed a search warrant at the nonprofit’s Vandalia Street offices. The company’s primary business is in computer training.
New Vision is located in an industrial area just north of University Avenue. A photo of the site was included in the FBI search warrant application (p. 4).
The blue door can be seen in the middle of the black and white photo, above.
According to records maintained by the state Dept. of Education, New Vision operated free-food distribution sites in St. Paul and Waite Park. New Vision took more than $2.7 million from the free-food program, claiming to a have served more than 1 million meals in 2021, under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future.
After the fact, the nonprofit’s board commissioned an independent financial audit for 2021. The audit makes clear that meals were not served at Vandalia St. but were supposed to be delivered. From the audit (p. 25):
New Vision’s largest food vendor ($2.2 million) was Ahlan Restaurant, located on E. Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis. The FBI search warrant (p. 21) includes a photo of the tiny restaurant.
Your correspondent visited the site yesterday and confirmed that a restaurant is still in operation at the address, but under a different name.
In my first piece, I linked to the earliest media accounts of the New Vision FBI raid, published by Sahan Journal and MPR News on the same day the search warrant was executed. Since then, other local outlets have published reports,
KARE-11: Feds raid St. Paul nonprofit in brand new Feeding our Future investigation
WCCO-4: Federal agents raid St. Paul nonprofit as part of Feeding Our Future fraud investigation
KSTP-5: St. Paul nonprofit searched by FBI in connection with Feeding Our Future scheme
Star Tribune: Feeding Our Future investigation focuses on St. Paul nonprofit
KARE-11’s Lou Raguse reported on New Vision’s other funding,
The nonprofit boasts on its website grants and donations from corporations and foundations such as 3M, Target, Comcast Foundation, Wells Fargo, Thrivent, and Greater Twin Cities United Way. In addition, New Vision Foundation also claims support from Ramsey County, MnDEED, and the City of Saint Paul.
I had previously documented grants from DEED. As for Ramsey County and St. Paul, this report describes one 2023 grant,
Ramsey County, Minnesota, has chosen New Vision Foundation and [redacted] to train the next generation of diverse local software engineering talent. With $1.2 million in funding from the federal American Rescue Plan, invested in partnership with the City of Saint Paul, 30 young people of color from Ramsey County will learn everything they need to contribute to our tech workforce.
The report continues,
The idea for this new program was born five years ago, when New Vision founder Hussein Farah and [redacted], now [redacted] CEO, were both Bush Foundation Fellows.
This report indicates that New Vison may have also received a small grant from Kandiyohi County.
To repeat, no charges have been filed.