Televangelist's family prospers from ministry

From a dried-up riverbed
A one-time pop singer, Copeland had a born-again experience and enrolled at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Okla. He worked as a pilot and chauffeur for Roberts himself.

He describes hearing his own call to preach standing in a dried-up riverbed.

Now a 500-employee operation with a budget in the tens of millions, Kenneth Copeland Ministries has won supporters worldwide through its conferences, prayer request network, disaster relief work, magazine and television program.

Kenneth Copeland Ministries is organized under the tax code as a church, so it gets a layer of privacy not afforded large secular and religious nonprofit groups that must disclose budgets and salaries. Pastors' pay must be "reasonable" under the federal tax code.

Copeland's current salary is not made public by his ministry. However, the church disclosed in a property-tax exemption application that his wages were $364,577 in 1995; Copeland's wife, Gloria, earned $292,593.

The Copeland family, however, is involved in ventures beyond the church world.

'Ranch of Faith'
John Copeland, a self-described "cowboy at heart," has a side business in ranching. Beginning in 1993, he leased church land to run his business, El Rancho Fe, Spanish for "Ranch of Faith."

Five years later, the church separately sold John Copeland land for his ranch and residence.

Lawrence Swicegood, director of media relations for Kenneth Copeland Ministries, said in a written response to questions that appraisals were done to determine fair market value, and the board approved both transactions. The lease is a good deal for the church, he said. John Copeland must improve the land, and county officials confirmed the church gets a roughly $100,000 annual tax break for putting it to agricultural use.

While the purchase price is not public record, the 33-acre property would have been worth about $93,000 that year, said John Marshall, executive director of the Tarrant Appraisal District.

The land is now valued at $554,160 by the district.

Until recently, the ranch also sold four breeds of horses. The El Rancho Fe Web site advertised the integrity of the Copeland name as a selling point.

'Deeply discounted'
Ellen Aprill, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles and a former U.S. Treasury Department official, said leasing and selling land to the church's top executive raises concerns. Under IRS rules, nonprofits can be penalized or lose their tax-exempt status if an executive, board member or other insider receives an economic benefit above and beyond what the organization gets in return.

"The church and its board must take great care to make sure the payments are fair to the church," Aprill said. "The church says it does. But is not clear how we can know."

Another Copeland relative runs a separate business with close ties to the ministry.

Douglas Neece, Gloria Copeland's brother-in-law, is president of Integrity Media, which plays a little-known but important role in the world of televangelism. It buys television time for the ministry.

Neece said in an interview that Copeland's ministry accounts for just over 50 percent of Integrity Media's business.

The church's board was informed of Neece's relationship to the Copelands, Swicegood said. The television time is bought at market rates and the ministry gets a discount from Integrity Media, he said.

Douglas Neece said his company charges a "deeply discounted" commission below the industry standard of 15 percent. "We earn our money," Neece said. "That's just the way it is ... We have nothing to hide."

The money involved is substantial. In a 1997 filing in Tarrant County, the church said it paid a "related party" $22 million for "telecast and mass media expense" in 1997 and received a discount of about $1.7 million on the transaction.

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