ALBANY — Threatened with a national freeze on the taxpayer dollars that fund it, the embattled activist group ACORN announced yesterday it was turning over a new leaf.
National ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis abruptly suspended housing programs exposed in a series of undercover video stings in recent days and ordered emergency training sessions for all frontline workers.
Lewis said the agency would not take in any new clients until the completion of a “top to bottom” review by an outside auditor to be named soon.
“We are committed to re-establishing the public trust,” Lewis said during an appearance on CNN yesterday. “I will clean this house. It is being done now.”
The action came less than a week after the first of several hidden-camera videos was released showing ACORN workers in Brooklyn and elsewhere offering illicit financial advice to a pair of conservative activists posing as a pimp and prostitute wanting to start a brothel.
The videos also featured ACORN affiliates in Baltimore, Washington and San Bernardino, Calif., fueling allegations of systemic corruption in the group.
In an undercover video unveiled last night on Fox’s “Hannity” program, a San Diego Acorn worker offered to help smuggle a dozen underage girls into the US for prostitution. “How much do you charge?” the worker asks one woman.
Last year, ACORN — whose political arm generally supports Democratic candidates — was racked by accusations of fraud in its nationwide voter-registration efforts.
Since the videos’ release, government officials at all levels have moved to freeze or cut off the millions of taxpayer dollars on which ACORN and its scores of affiliates depend for support.
Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes launched an investigation into the ACORN workers featured in one video.
“This is not the first time we’ve gone through this damage control,” said state Sen. Martin Golden (R-Brooklyn).
“If they correct things, they can come back and show people what a great organization they are, but they have a long way to go to get to that level of confidence.
“Until then, I don’t think any funding from the city, state or federal government should be going to the organization.”
Lewis said an independent advisory council appointed by ACORN in the wake of the voting-fraud scandal would now name an outside investigator “to conduct a thorough review of all of the organization’s relevant systems and processes.”
A Post reporter who visited the Nevins Street office building in Brooklyn that ACORN shares with the left-leaning Working Families Party was greeted by a sign that read: “There will be no new intakes for any of the services at ACORN or ACORN Housing until further notice.”
The reporter was turned down after requesting an appointment for one of the group’s loan-counseling and tax-preparation services.
“No,” an ACORN employee said. “Not until further notice.”
Assemblyman Darryl Towns (D-Brooklyn), who has sponsored several legislative grants for ACORN over the years, said he was pleased by the group’s promise to clean up its act.
Additional reporting by Sabrina Ford