Researching the 501(c)(3)
Becoming a not-for-profit organization appears to be pretty simple. Getting 501(c)(3) (tax-exempt) status, not quite so easy.
For the poor souls out there who haven’t had a course in Everything You Ever Needed to Know about Theatre Management from the fabulous Don Marinelli (founder and head of Carnegie Mellon’s Entertainment Technology Center), a 501(c)(3) is an organization that the IRS has exempted from paying taxes, because of their charitable work in education, scientific research, religion, or a whole slew of other altruistic things. Even better, though, is the fact that any charitable donations made to a 501(c)(3) are tax-deductible - is that a great way to get people to give you money, or what?
So, I’m looking into what it takes to achieve tax-exempt status, since we’ll definitely want to do that before we start asking people to give us money. Nolo has a great little online guide to get you started, but it seems that - like everything else - the rules for incorportating and applying for tax-exempt status are a little bit different in California than they are in the rest of the country.
Of course, there’s a book for just that problem, so I stopped by Nolo’s outlet in Berkeley the other day and picked it up. I’d never used one of Nolo’s books before, but I’m incredibly impressed, just from the small amount I’ve read so far - if you’re in the market for a layman’s guide to anything law-related, they’re definitely the place to go.
I’ll post updates here as I glean key pieces of information on starting a non-profit, but for now I leave you with this tidbit: If you’re doing anything that involves legal stuff, and you’re in California, research it very carefully, because everything works differently here. Everything.
