AIDS Charity Sues Over Loss of Funding
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation has sued Los Angeles County, alleging that officials withdrew $700,000 of its annual funding in 1996 because foundation leaders criticized the county for cutting some AIDS programs.
Michael Weinstein, president of the nonprofit advocacy agency and hospice, said the amended lawsuit was filed Friday in Superior Court to get the foundation’s funding back. It expands the scope of a lawsuit the foundation filed against the county last year, alleging similar political interference in the way the county disburses AIDS funding to nonprofit organizations.
“This [new] suit will stop the county from trampling on our rights to advocate for our patients,” Weinstein said in an interview.
Weinstein alleges that the foundation’s $1.9-million budget was cut by more than a third in November 1996 after he charged that the Board of Supervisors missed out on millions of dollars in federal AIDS funding because it did not lobby hard enough.
County officials say that since acknowledging more than a year ago that they needed to do a better job of securing federal AIDS funds, they have done so. County lawyers did not return calls seeking comment Tuesday on the lawsuit.
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