From an article by Gil Alexander-Moegerle, Dobson's original co-host for the Focus on the Family radio program:
Consider the story of two book publishing companies, Focus on the Family, Incorporate(;, and Word, Incorporated, one of the largest publishing houses serving the conservative Protestant world. Both solicit, sign, publish, and pay authors for manuscripts and then publish and sell those books in commercial bookstores, making a profit in the process. Both solicit manuscripts from exactly the same pool of author-- those written by conservative Christians on subjects that would be considered of religious or spiritual help to the reader. Both produce books for sale in exactly the same bookstores. Both advertise and promote. Both enjoy revenue from such sales. However, one of these companies does all the above and pays its fair share of taxes while the other insists that it should not have to pay taxes and does not do so. This second business claims that it has a right as a 501(c)3 to opt out of its share of taxes but still uses the government services that taxes pay for. Why? What is the difference between Focus and Word with regard to the book publishing enterprises of each? Is one a national treasure like the Grand Canyon that we've all decided to preserve and subsidize while Word is on its own to sink or swim in the great competitive marketplace? Are we, as American taxpayers, interested in digging a little deeper into our pockets when our tax bill arrives in order to support the publishing efforts of Focus on the Family, all the while discriminating against the equally valuable work done by Word by not subsidizing their enterprise?
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Christopher Chang, a member of the staff of the city of Pomona, California, office of economic development supplied me with a report analyzing the precise impact on that city of the loss of property taxes, not to mention other taxes levied on normal businesses, when Focus on the Family was occupying office space in Pomona several years ago but not paying taxes. The report shows that Focus owned property with a valuation of $5,115,660, on which the property taxes during their three-year stay in Pomona would have totaled approximately $150,000. An estimated $150,000 in city services were used, but were not paid for by Focus on the Family. So who paid them?
The median annual household income in Pomona was $31,000 when Focus was located there. Pomona's population was 75 percent minorities. So minority families trying to survive in the Los Angeles area on $31,000 a year were given no choice but to pitch in a little extra so millionaire businessman Dobson, who lived twenty miles away in an upper-class white neighborhood, didn't have to pay any property taxes. Focus has not been able to sell its Pomona headquarters building since leaving town for Colorado in 1991. So that piece of property is still off the tax rolls to this day, and those neighbors are still paying for the street light in front of the vacant complex at 801 Corporate Center Drive. We can do better than that.
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Another specific problem that our experience with Dobson highlights is the ability of so-called religious organizations to defy the standards of fair employment practices our society has established: to invade the privacy of a company's employees, to coerce them unfairly with threats of termination, to breach even internal company policy, and to obstruct justice and block all avenues to due process when employment grievances arise all in the name of religion, Surely we can provide American workers a fairer workplace than that.
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/fofcult4.htm
That last part is especially important to highlight in a world with the Hobby-Lobby case going to the Supreme Court.
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