Lutheran Social Services of Nevada is selling its headquarters on Boulder Highway to another nonprofit, according to Clark County, which a decade ago gave millions of dollars in taxpayer funds toward the building’s construction.
The Clark County district attorney’s office, meanwhile, has demanded that the organization repay about $39,000 for services that were not performed under a county contract, according to a letter provided by the county.
“This is just such a train wreck,” said the Rev. Marta Poling Schmitt, a retired Lutheran pastor who as a board member of the nonprofit and a donor helped to open the headquarters in 2018.
After an eight-year absence, she returned to the board in May 2025 before resigning when, she said, the nonprofit’s chief executives refused to resign themselves.
“They’ve got to get out of there,” Schmitt said about the remaining leadership. “There has to be a new history made there.”
The need is great for services in the impoverished Boulder Highway corridor, she said. The organization had been offering hot meals for seniors, a food pantry where clients regularly could get groceries, and other services such as housing assistance.
Lutheran Social Services — only loosely affiliated with the Lutheran Church, which has largely cut ties — has struggled financially in recent years and seen its reputation marred by controversy, including claims of mismanagement that came to light after it suspended operations in October.
Several board members and key employees quit in September 2024 after learning, they said, of monthly $8,500 payments apiece to the wife of then-CEO Tim Bedwell, Michele, and to her business partner Adam Kent, even as the nonprofit struggled to make payroll and pay vendors.
Tim Bedwell has said that the payments were aboveboard and that board members either knew of the payments or ought to have known. He said Michele Bedwell performed marketing and fundraising functions, and Kent assumed executive duties.
Lutheran Social Services was founded 40 years ago by the Lutheran community. Until recently, local Lutheran churches regularly donated to the nonprofit and provided it with volunteers.
The Lutheran Church has no direct control over the nonprofit, apart from the limited oversight provided by the one or two ministers who typically were part of the board of directors.
CEO moves on
The board’s two pastors — Schmitt and the Rev. Hans-Lothar Dettling — resigned in December after Tim Bedwell, Kent and board Chair Carrie Cox refused to resign. Since then, Tim Bedwell, a former North Las Vegas police officer, appears to have moved on.
His LinkedIn page indicates that his tenure as CEO, which began in January 2024, ended last month. He did not respond to a request for comment.
He has launched BEDWELL, “a music and storytelling project built around faith, grit, resilience, redemption, service, and love of country,” according to his page. He released a music video, “America is Worth the Work,” around the Fourth of July holiday and has compiled a nine-track rock album.
In March, he filed for divorce from Michele Bedwell, stating that the couple had become incompatible, District Court records show.
The three individuals listed as board members on the nonprofit’s website did not comment for this story. Attorney Jason Stoffel did not return a reporter’s phone call. Shawn Davis confirmed he remained a board member but deferred to Cox for comment. Cox returned a reporter’s call but then could not be reached for an interview.
Building in escrow
County spokesperson Jennifer Cooper said in a recent email exchange that the remaining members of the nonprofit “have moved forward with selling the building to another non-profit.”
The sale is in escrow, she said. She later confirmed the identity of the possible buyer.
“It is my understanding that Hope Christian is the organization purchasing the building,” she wrote. She did not know what services the organization planned to provide.
Hope Christian Health Center is a federally qualified health center, meaning that it receives federal funding for providing services in underserved areas. The North Las Vegas-based center describes itself as a “non-profit, faith-based family medicine center.”
Members of its executive team did not respond to several phone messages from a reporter.
Schmitt said there have long been plans for a health center on Lutheran Social Services’ campus, which already includes a Boys & Girls Club, a charter school and low-income housing.
“The county previously was aware of the pressing poverty on the Boulder Highway corridor, and that’s one of the reasons they engaged in this big development,” she said.
In December 2016, Clark County approved $5.8 million in federal Community Development Block Grant funds for what was described as the Boulder Highway Collaborative Campus. About half of the funding was to build the Lutheran Social Services building and the other half a Boys & Girls Club, Cooper said.
In 2023, the county awarded $1.8 million in federal grant dollars for Lutheran Social Services to build an addition that included an expanded kitchen.
This spring, the county was exploring its options regarding the Lutheran Social Services building, including whether it had a claim to take possession of the building.
However, Cooper said recently that the grant funding awarded “did not mean that the County would take over building operations, that was not the intention of the dollars, as reflected in the deed restriction.”
The 2018 deed requires that the building remain a community resource center for 15 years or that the county be reimbursed based on the current fair market value of the property.
“The CDBG funds provided over a decade ago require that the building be used for certain purposes … and so long as whomever occupies the space continues to provide these types of services, there is no CDBG funding to recapture,” Cooper wrote on Monday.
It’s unclear how the proceeds of a sale would be used. However, Lutheran Social Services owes money to a bank and to vendors.
In 2024, the nonprofit used the building as collateral to take out a $750,000 line of credit from MidFirst Bank, documents show. Jon Paul, the nonprofit’s part-time chief financial officer for most of 2025, said the line of credit was tapped out before he joined the organization. It was not paid back, he said.
Because the nonprofit did not have a clear title to the building, conversations about the bank taking possession stalled, Paul told the Las Vegas Review-Journal earlier this year. A bank representative did not return a reporter’s call.
Paul, a member of a local Lutheran church, continued to volunteer his services after he stopped getting paid in July. The nonprofit owes him $25,000 in pay, he said.
He said he was told in late December that his services no longer were required after he questioned a $42,300 payment to Michele Bedwell when the nonprofit received $310,000 in federal tax credits.
In November, Michele Bedwell told the Review-Journal that she continued to work for the nonprofit but had been paid only $2,500 in the previous five months. In January, she said she no longer worked there.
In December, Sting Alarm placed liens on the property for $25,200 in unpaid labor and materials, according to records from the county recorder’s office. In June, Sting filed a notice of lis pendens, a formal action that alerts potential buyers of a dispute involving the property, records show.
Paul said recently that the pending sale of the building, and with it a new start, sounded “very positive … but not necessarily for the Lutherans” who had hoped earlier this year to wrest back control of the nonprofit.
Demand letter
A June 15 demand letter from the district attorney’s office to the nonprofit states that it serves as final notice for repayment of $39,375 in advanced payment for services not provided and for documentation of the nonprofit’s requests for reimbursement.
The letter states that Clark County Social Services “made repeated efforts throughout 2025, to work collaboratively with Lutheran Social Services of Nevada (LSSN) regarding reporting compliance, program readiness, operational concerns, reimbursement submissions, and fiscal reconciliation.”
Deputy District Attorney Brandon Thompson wrote the letter to Cox and Kent, whom the letter identified as the chief operating officer and acting CEO.
“Despite multiple meetings, extensions, and requests for clarification, outstanding fiscal and contractual obligations remain unresolved,” Thompson wrote.
Kent did not respond to a request for comment.
Failure to comply with the demands could result in legal action, wrote Thompson, who works in the civil division of the district attorney’s office.
The letter gave a deadline of July 6. As of July 9, the funds had not been paid.
“Conversations remain ongoing related to recouping the funds,” Cooper wrote to the Review-Journal.
The county no longer contracts with the nonprofit to provide services, she said.
In April, the County Commission terminated two housing contracts, including one to “provide assistance to families with children experiencing homelessness to quickly transition into permanent housing,” according to a staff report accompanying the commission agenda item.
No charges filed
In January, Las Vegas police interviewed multiple former associates of the nonprofit. Police asked about payments to Michele Bedwell and to Kent, and about whether there had been payments to Cox, a Henderson City Council member.
Detectives also asked about a $10 million contract awarded to Lutheran Social Services by the Southern Nevada Regional Housing Authority in August 2024 and terminated a year later after the nonprofit had been paid almost $600,000.
The Review-Journal asked the Police Department for the audio or transcripts of interviews that are part of this inquiry. The department denied the request, stating that the records “pertain to an open criminal investigation and/or criminal proceedings.”
No charges have been filed in connection with the nonprofit’s financial dealings.
The public integrity unit of the Metropolitan Police Department, which interviewed the nonprofit’s former associates, is the same unit that investigated Cox on a separate matter.
In November, Cox was indicted under a rarely used state law on a felony charge alleging she eavesdropped on a fellow council member and surreptitiously recorded her conversation. She has pleaded not guilty.
Meanwhile, the nonprofit still occasionally distributes food and other items from its headquarters.
On July 8, workers at the pantry were handing out bags of food to a steady trickle of people who showed up at its doors. Looking through her three bags, client Marissa Johnson said she had received apples, onions, bread and doughnuts.
After ushering a reporter out of the building, a worker said recent donations had made the distribution possible. She declined to give her name.
“That’s all I’m going to tell you. Thank you. Have a nice day,” the worker said before the pantry door slammed and locked.
Contact investigative reporter Mary Hynes at mhynes@reviewjournal.com or at 702-383-0336. Follow @MaryHynes1 on X.
