Following up on
my post over the weekend, the New Orleans headquarters of
ACORN is closing and the property itself, a former funeral home,
is up for sale.
ACORN insiders told me after the news above went out that the
property on Elysian Fields Avenue in the Big Easy has been up for
sale for six months.
Nevertheless a photograph below of a "for sale" sign on the
property is a perfect illustration of ACORN's big problems that
grow more serious with every passing day. I wrote about ACORN's
slow-motion collapse weeks ago right here at the American
Spectator, well before the undercover sting videos
surfaced.
I am reposting the blog post from the weekend with the photo
added below...

Photo taken Oct. 3, 2009 by BigGovernment.com contributor Kevin Kane at ACORN Headquarters in the Big Easy
* * * * *
I broke this story exclusively on
BigGovernment.com on Saturday:
A credible source claims the embattled left-wing advocacy group
ACORN is poised to announce massive staff layoffs but an ACORN
spokesman denies this is the case.
A credible source close to the Association of Community
Organizations for Reform Now revealed that the activist network
intends to lay off all staff members operating out of its New
Orleans headquarters. All information provided by the source to
this reporter in the past has turned out to be correct.
However, ACORN spokesman Scott Levenson of the public relations
firm The Advance Group in New York City said the source was
incorrect. In an interview Friday afternoon with Levenson he said
(referring to BigGovernment.com), “You guys just can’t get it
right. You’re wrong again.” When pressed to elaborate, Levenson
declined to do so. Levenson received media attention earlier this
year when Fox News host Glenn Beck ejected the combative
publicist from his studio during a commercial break. Beck said at
the time that Levenson accused him of being a racist.
My source said that one of the employees to be cashiered in the
Crescent City is the daughter of disgraced ACORN founder Wade
Rathke. Rathke’s wife, Beth Butler, also works for ACORN but it
is unclear at this point if she too will be laid off. Rathke’s
son also reportedly is employed by ACORN.
ACORN also plans to lay off two-thirds of its Washington, D.C.,
staffers as soon as Wednesday of next week, according to the
source. Layoffs will also extend to ACORN’s affiliate the ACORN
Institute.
The source also revealed that all or most of ACORN’s development
staff in the group’s New York City office will soon be laid off
if they haven’ been laid off already.
ACORN’s already tarnished image took a major hit last month when
BigGovernment.com
unveiled undercover sting videos in which ACORN staffers across
America were shown advising a pair posing as a pimp and a
prostitute on the finer points of avoiding prosecution for
prostitution, importation of underage illegal aliens to serve as
sex workers, obtaining government grants under false pretenses,
and tax evasion.
The adverse publicity generated by the videos and the group’s
never-ending scandals is slowly but surely drying up ACORN’s
funding sources.