discuss: Thread: Volunteer Match affiliation

I try to have us affilited by VolunteerMatch, and it seems we a going
forward.

I'm in relation with them by mail. On the registration form, I gave
the UNC adress (in the "physical location"), but of course explained
what we are. even proposed to affiliate from my own (french) LUG.

and I received this:

"Hi Jean-Daniel,

If you are affiliated with UNC Chapel Hill, provide documentation and
we can get you approved.

Regards,
Dee
The VolunteerMatch Team"

does somebody have a link there or may I ask ibiblio admins to backup
our subscribtion? I have a ticket number I can give privately

jdd

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http://wiki.tldp.org
http://www.dodin.net

Quoting Jean-Daniel Dodin ####@####.####

> I try to have us affilited by VolunteerMatch, and it seems we a going
> forward.

David Lawyer knows quite a bit about that, so you should confer with
him.  Here's text from VolunteerMatch Help, item "Can My Organization
Join VolunteerMatch?":

   VolunteerMatch encourages all community service organizations to
   register on our site. The following organizations are welcome to join
   the VolunteerMatch community:

   1. Organizations with 501(c) tax exempt status
   2. Government entities within the United States, including public 
      schools and libraries
   3. Organizations with state-level tax exemption
   4. Organizations fiscally sponsored by another organization with 501(c)
      status
   5. Registered political campaigns
   6. For-profit hospices, hospitals, long-term care facilities and schools

   Organizations located outside of the US are welcome to register and post
   opportunities on VolunteerMatch. As we do not offer a formal
   international program, opportunities outside of the US will only be
   visible to a small percentage of VolunteerMatch users.

Organisations will, as a practical matter for dealing with the
VolunteerMatch online forms, almost certainly need to register their
existence with the USA Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in order to get an
Employer Identification Number (EIN), because VolunteerMatch appears to
insist that you provide an EIN to register your organisation.

Because it's not apparent to laymen (I used to do accounting and finance
work, many years ago), I'll explain the term "501(c)".  That's part of
the section of the United States Code (the code of Federal primary law) 
that established the IRS:  Title 26 of the US Code is the "Internal
Revenue Code.  Within that title, section 501, paragraph c (written "26
U.S.C. 501(c)") is where non-profit organisations are defined.[1]

There are quite a few sub-categories of 501(c) non-profts -- 28 of them,
in fact.  The best-known are:

501(c)(3):  Charities operated exclusively for religious, charitable,
            scientific, literary, educational (etc.) purposes -- 
            classic charities.  (There are very stringent restrictions
            on what this class of group is permitted to do, and the
            groups must also be incoporated before IRS will grant this
            status.)
501(c)(7):  Recreation or social groups
501(c)(6):  Business leagues and guilds.
501(c)(4):  Civic and social-welfare groups.
501(c)(8):  Fraternal societies that pay for members' care.
501(c)(10): Fraternal societies that don't.

All 501(c) organisations are exempt from USA Federal income taxes 
(though, unless your group is earning a substantial amount of revenue,
IRS simply doesn't care and won't go after it for income taxes).
Applying for IRS recognition of one's nonprofit group's 501(c)-whatever
tax-exempt status is, itself, pretty expensive and there's typically
many months of delay before you get your "determination letter".




> I'm in relation with them by mail. On the registration form, I gave
> the UNC adress (in the "physical location"), but of course explained
> what we are. even proposed to affiliate from my own (french) LUG.
> 
> and I received this:
> 
> "Hi Jean-Daniel,
> 
> If you are affiliated with UNC Chapel Hill, provide documentation and
> we can get you approved.
> 
> Regards,
> Dee
> The VolunteerMatch Team"

I'm just guessing that tney're assuming you're going to try to qualify
on the basis of UNC having 501(c) tax-exempt status.  I'm pretty sure
the UNC is 501(c)(3).

But I'm pretty sure LDP is not "affiliated" in the sense VolunteerMatch
is going to require for that sort of membership.


[1] Please see also http://tldp.org/HOWTO/User-Group-HOWTO-7.html#ss7.1,
subhead "United States of America".

Rick Moen a écrit :

> David Lawyer knows quite a bit about that

yes, I know - in fact I found the Volunteer Match name here, but tried
to subscribe before having seen the previous thread on discuss (I read
 it after)

> I'm just guessing that tney're assuming you're going to try to qualify
> on the basis of UNC having 501(c) tax-exempt status.  I'm pretty sure
> the UNC is 501(c)(3).
> 
> But I'm pretty sure LDP is not "affiliated" in the sense VolunteerMatch
> is going to require for that sort of membership.

I have two directions.

* VM accept to see us as a department of UNC - may be UNC is already
affiliated? (need of course UNC approval)

* VM accepts (say so) forein groups. my LUG *is* incorporated and so
should be accepted, if they accept french groups. then we could ask
help for the LDP

jdd


-- 
jdd for the Linux Documentation Project
http://wiki.tldp.org
http://www.dodin.net

On Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 10:04:36AM +0100, jdd for http://tldp.org wrote:
> Rick Moen a ?crit :
> 
> > David Lawyer knows quite a bit about that
> 
> yes, I know - in fact I found the Volunteer Match name here, but tried
> to subscribe before having seen the previous thread on discuss (I read
>  it after)
> 
> > I'm just guessing that tney're assuming you're going to try to qualify
> > on the basis of UNC having 501(c) tax-exempt status.  I'm pretty sure
> > the UNC is 501(c)(3).
> > 
> > But I'm pretty sure LDP is not "affiliated" in the sense VolunteerMatch
> > is going to require for that sort of membership.
> 
> I have two directions.
> 
> * VM accept to see us as a department of UNC - may be UNC is already
> affiliated? (need of course UNC approval)

I don't think this will be possible.  But there are corporations like
"Software in the Public Interest" that serve as "umbrellas" for small
organizations (like LDP) that don't have the resources to incorporate
on their on.  LDP becomes a branch of their corporation but retains
autonomy and keeps it's name as a branch name.  To do this, we would
need to get approval of their board of directors I think.
> 
> * VM accepts (say so) foreign groups. my LUG *is* incorporated and so
> should be accepted, if they accept french groups. then we could ask
> help for the LDP

But the French LUG would need to accept us as part of them and they
are not set up to do this (there needs to be an agreement as to what
LDPs autonomy would be like, etc.).  If the LUG were to sign up for
volunteer match, I think it would seem devious if they used it to
recruit for another organization like LDP.

			David Lawyer

David Lawyer a écrit :

> I don't think this will be possible.  But there are corporations like
> "Software in the Public Interest" that serve as "umbrellas" for small
> organizations (like LDP) that don't have the resources to incorporate
> on their on.  LDP becomes a branch of their corporation but retains
> autonomy and keeps it's name as a branch name.  To do this, we would
> need to get approval of their board of directors I think.

could you do that or do you want me to do?

>> * VM accepts (say so) foreign groups. my LUG *is* incorporated and so
>> should be accepted, if they accept french groups. then we could ask
>> help for the LDP
> 
> But the French LUG would need to accept us as part of them and they
> are not set up to do this (there needs to be an agreement as to what
> LDPs autonomy would be like, etc.).  If the LUG were to sign up for
> volunteer match, I think it would seem devious if they used it to
> recruit for another organization like LDP.

I'm the chairman of this LUG, and Guylhem was some years ago member of
the board. Searching voluteers for the LDP is certainly a project y
LUG could do (but this could be a problem for VM, may be)

"Software in the Public Interest" seems a very promising thing! (I
suppose it's that:http://www.spi-inc.org/about-spi/about-spi)

se also the other thread I just open

jdd

-- 
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http://valerie.dodin.org
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On Thu, Oct 30, 2008 at 08:51:08AM +0100, jdd wrote:
> David Lawyer a ?crit :
> 
> > I don't think this will be possible.  But there are corporations like
> > "Software in the Public Interest" that serve as "umbrellas" for small
> > organizations (like LDP) that don't have the resources to incorporate
> > on their on.  LDP becomes a branch of their corporation but retains
> > autonomy and keeps it's name as a branch name.  To do this, we would
> > need to get approval of their board of directors I think.
> 
> could you do that or do you want me to do?

I don't want to do it, mainly due to lack of time.  So before we try
to become part of a corporation, the discuss and staff lists need to
agree that we should do this.  I support the idea provided that it's
not too difficult to do it.

			David Lawyer

Quoting David Lawyer ####@####.####

> I don't want to do it, mainly due to lack of time.  So before we try
> to become part of a corporation, the discuss and staff lists need to
> agree that we should do this.  I support the idea provided that it's
> not too difficult to do it.

I have a suggestion based largely on an extremely unpleasant experience
the Silicon Valley Linux User Group had when it affiliated with a
non-profit group that claimed to be incorporated[1] and to be in the
middle of arrangements to provide liability insurance coverage, etc.:
Make very sure that LDP has a very clear, well documented agreement that
provides a means for LDP to terminate its affiliation with whatever
parent group you decide to pick.  (You spoke of LDP "retaining its
autonomy", and that's a good idea, too, but all that can ultimately 
guarantee that right is a documented right to withdraw.)

SVLUG found itself bound to a group that eventually got around to trying
to interfere in its internal affairs and (for a while) refused to let it
go.  The matter was worked out, but only after much dissention.


[1] The claims turned out to be deceptive; it later emerged that the
parent group had not even yet filed its incorporation application, at
that time.

Rick Moen a écrit :

> provides a means for LDP to terminate its affiliation with whatever
> parent group you decide to pick

pesonnally I wont affiliate the LDP if affiliate mean giving any
rights to the other on us!

I see affiliating as in most association: being a member as long as
you want only as for LDP members, anybody can leave!)

but it's a good idea to enforce this!

jdd


-- 
jdd for the Linux Documentation Project
http://wiki.tldp.org
http://www.dodin.net