A Third of Oral Roberts’ $60-Million Budget Goes to Broadcasting Expenses

Television evangelist Oral Roberts said this week that his organization spent more than $60 million in the year ended July 31, with almost one-third of it going for broadcasting expenses.

The accounting of expenditures of the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Assn. was published in the September/October issue of the organization’s Abundant Life Magazine and distributed to its financial contributors.

Of a total of $60,833,198 in expenditures, the greatest single expense was $19,491,501 for the production of Oral Roberts’ Sunday program and son Richard’s daily evangelical program. The second-highest expenditure was $8,369,764 for Roberts’ medical missionary program.

Roberts said his salary as president of Oral Roberts University was $56,000 annually and he and his wife, Evelyn, received a joint salary of $42,000 a year from the evangelistic association.

According to the magazine, other ministry expenditures included $7,496,569, or 12.3%, for “mail and partner communications;” $5,771,883, or 9.6%, for operational expenses, and $5 million, or 8.2%, for Oral Roberts University student support.