I think fiscal sponsorship by CLIR is definitely the sweet spot. It's
pretty awesome CLIR is offering on those terms, really, and it's not
entirely risk-free for them obviously. It's a real vote of confidence.

Setting up your own 501-c-3 gives you LOTS of financial and legal
obligations. Even just financially, I'm pretty sure it would not come up
advantageously, on book-keeping and tax preparation alone, compared to
CLIR's . And it requires a persistent governance structure that I'm not
sure Code4Lib actually wants or needs -- I think many of us like the
amorphous aspect of Code4Lib -- more community than organization -- and I
think the CLIR proposal pretty much keeps it. But even for those who don't,
just on financial considerations alone, your own 501c3 is not the smooth
easy choice.

CLIR's flat $5000 fee is very reasonable -- based on historical conference
budgets of $100K to $250K, that's percentage-wise 2%-5%, which is actually
a quite low fiscal sponsorship fee. And they're doing it flat fee not
percentage, which is actually great. I assume the fee would be rolled into
conference budget, since that's Code4Lib's only real income.  It's really
quite a good offer from CLIR, unusually good terms both financially and
organizationally for the full fiscal sponsorship they are offering. I
assume they are doing it because they want to support Code4Lib as part of
their mission.

As far as "what to do with any money leftover from a conference" -- the
default answer seems obvious, just roll it into the next year's conf
budget, whether via scholarships or making registration slightly cheaper
for everyone, as it has always been.

Jonathan

On Mon, Jan 23, 2017 at 5:51 PM, Galen Charlton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Mon, Jan 23, 2017 at 5:44 PM, Karen Coyle <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> > Did you look at other states in terms of becoming a 501c3? I was under
> the
> > impression that some states are easier/cheaper than others.
>
> Not in depth -- the focus on Georgia was largely driven by the
> availability of an attorney who I knew and trusted and who generously
> gave of his time. Since there is, to my knowledge, nothing that ties
> Code4Lib to any particular state, I expect that if we decide to set up
> a 501(c)3 that we'd do a scan to find the most advantageous
> jurisdiction to register in.
>
> I should mention that I wouldn't want to preclude the possibility of
> registering as a Canadian nonprofit, but we did not investigate the
> legal issues that might arise from that option.
>
> > There's also the Tides Foundation in San Francisco that provides the
> > structure for a non-profit (staff, legal work, fiscal sponsorship, etc.)
> It
> > seems to be stable.
> >
> > http://www.tides.org/i-want-to/turn-my-vision-ideas-into-
> a-nonprofit-project/start-a-nonprofit-project/
> >
> > http://www.tides.org/i-want-to/turn-my-vision-ideas-into-
> a-nonprofit-project/learn-about-fiscal-sponsorship-at-
> tides/service-overview/
>
> Thank you for sharing this; I'll incorporate this this on the IG's
> resource list.
>
> Regards,
>
> Galen
> --
> Galen Charlton
> [log in to unmask]
>