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JNF: An Opaque Charity that Owns 13% of Israel’s Land
An effort to bring the Jewish National Fund, which controls 13 percent of the land of Israel, under increased governmental oversight and transparency failed in a vote of the Netanyahu cabinet. Despite...
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Back from the Brink: San Diego Opera Board Unanimously Rescinds Vote to Close
Following two months of public turmoil, followed by an extraordinary show of support from San Diegans and the broader cultural community, San Diego Opera has raised about $4 million, enough to move...
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Challenge Grants: A Mechanism for Double and Lasting Value
Sometimes it is worth acknowledging the tried-and-true mechanisms that work well in spreading philanthropy and gaining impact in its application. The humble challenge grant is one of our favorites!
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Many Red States Are Largest Recipients of Federal Assistance
A new study shows how significantly the incomes of residents in many states, particularly “red states,” depend on federal government transfers.
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Is the 1023-EZ a Step Backward for Regulators and Nonprofits?
The IRS’s proposed short form for tax-exemption as a charity shrinks a 22-page Form 1023 to a three-page Form 1023-EZ. Easier to fill out and approve, but is requiring no documentation from new...
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Is Debt Collection the Next Frontier for Nonprofits?
Tulsa debt collector Bill Bartmann thinks that debt collection is a business line that nonprofits should pursue, with an upside to their bottom lines. Good idea?
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After Growth Plan Fails, a YMCA Files for Bankruptcy
The YMCA in Milwaukee has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to allow for restructuring of the organization. According to the bankruptcy petition, the organization has amassed $29 million in debt and has...
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The State of Black Museums—Part I
In the midst of debates over Detroit’s future coming out of an unprecedented big city bankruptcy, the fate of cultural institutions rose to the forefront, largely focused on the future of the Detroit...
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San Jose Rep Theater Goes Under; Latest Down in Recent Arts Upheavals
As onlookers, it appears to us to be a very dangerous time for performing arts organizations, and this week the San Jose Repertory Theatre declared itself out of business. Reportedly, the move will...
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Homeless Social Enterprise in Brooklyn May Need New Location
Sure We Can appears to be an admirable organization, operating New York City’s only nonprofit redemption center to which homeless persons can bring empty cans and bottles. Given the expensive Brooklyn...
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Eight Sobering Thoughts for Social Impact Bond Supporters
Among some promoters of social impact bonds, one might find a tendency toward irrational exuberance. They’ll slip into language that suggests the market discipline purportedly inserted into social...
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A Town Cuts Senior Programs; A Community Foundation Steps In
Henderson, Nevada is cutting back on funding for senior programs—and the pressure is on philanthropy to make up the difference.
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Charlotte Set to Lose a Nonprofit Theater with Strong Area Ties
After a bold move to a new home and securing local and national sources of support as part of the process, a nonprofit theater in Charlotte opts to shut down.
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California Nonprofit Hospital Exec Salary Cap Fails to Make the Ballot
A ballot initiative that would have limited the compensation of executives at nonprofit hospitals has failed to qualify for the November ballot. It’s an issue that has garnered attention recently with...
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Governance Gone Awry in North Miami Museum
Many nonprofit cultural institutions operate in facilities owned by municipal governments, but generally with board and staff leadership independent from the city itself. At North Miami’s Museum of...
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“Payroll Will Be Deferred until Further Notice”
This community health center needs a hero.
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Operating Above Its Financial Skill Level Not Good for This Nonprofit
NPQ has a lot of empathy for new organizations that misunderstand the level of skill they need to do decent financial management, but it is important to learn your lesson the first time you realize...
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What Can We Learn from New York’s Nonprofit Revitalization Act of 2013?
As the Nonprofit Revitalization Act of 2013 takes effect in New York, is there anything we can learn from it, or are there any trends we should watch out for?
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Fundraising Costs Queried Down Under
A fundraising company is being investigated by a state government regulatory agency in Australia.
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Using Loans: A 101 Guide To Borrowing For Nonprofit Organizations
If anyone would know the rules for using loans as a nonprofit, it would be the Nonprofit Assistance Fund. This piece is good to share with board members as a base of commonly understood information...
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Low-Interest Bond Program for Nonprofits May Continue, Says Maine Gov
The 20-year-old program has saved charities millions, but that alone did not convince the governor to continue the public-private partnership; now, that’s changed.
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Seeking What Makes Us Valid as People and as Organizations
Authenticity sometimes seems like a rare commodity – yet it is valuable beyond words in the work we do. Here we reprint a moving speech by Paul Hogan to the Buffalo Society of Artists about art, mental...
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Major Nonprofit Merger Develops Organically with a Little Push from the...
In a deal that will result in the 13th largest public garden in the United States, the Cleveland Botanical Garden and the Holden Arboretum, established within one year of each other in 1930 and 1931,...
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A “Classic Case” Merger: What Tends to Make Them Work
Two sheltering programs in the Greater Atlanta metropolitan area are merging and their situation provides a “classic case” of the factors that often underlie a successful merger.
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American Opera, Rising
San Diego Opera is on the rebound from its near-death experience. The Metropolitan Opera labor dispute is still simmering, with contracts that will expire in another month. As opera companies across...
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Boards and Magical Thinking
Wild ambition to create change and good governance can easily coexist, and NPQ believes that working for the impossible to become possible is what this sector is all about. Perhaps that requires some...
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Community Foundation CEO Steps Down After 20 Years and Leaves Ideas for the...
Before Nancy Kieling accepted a job at the Princeton Area Community Foundation twenty years ago, she had never heard of a community foundation. In six months, she will leave behind an organization that...
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Historic Social Enterprise Cries Uncle as SF Rent Rises
Nonprofits in high-rent towns like New York and San Francisco are having a hard time with space, and so it is perhaps no surprise that at the end of July, Under One Roof, a historic social enterprise...
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Carmel Tea Party Argues for Municipal Transparency
Even the Tea Party can get something sort of right. In Carmel, Indiana, a local Tea Party group is pushing for enhanced standards of municipal government transparency.
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The “People’s Opera” May Rise Again, But It’s a Waiting Game for Buyers
There are potential buyers waiting to be given the chance to buy and resuscitate the New York City Opera, and one of them thinks the board, grinding its way through bankruptcy proceedings, is dragging...
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Reporter Views Lack of Salary Disclosure as Provocative Indicator
An Asheville, N.C reporter reveals a bit of his thinking and it is worth considering: In his opinion, when an organization working with tax dollars refuses to reveal top salaries, they warrant a deeper...
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Under Re-Construction: San Diego Opera Cutting Costs and Rebuilding Trust for...
After the highly publicized near-closure of the San Diego Opera this spring, the organization has cut its operating budget by about a third—including some staff layoffs—and is preparing to raise the...
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Improbable Tales: Nonprofit Gives Back $10 Million Grant (and $10M Match)
When is a multimillion dollar grant not needed? When it locks you into a way of doing things that is either unsustainable or simply not ideal.
View ArticleFinancial Cautionary Tales for Nonprofits (Google+ Hangout)
Kate Barr of the Nonprofits Assistance Fund joined Nonprofit Quarterly for a special webinar where Kate shared vividly illustrated cautionary tales about how to avoid common nonprofit financial traps....
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A Common Picture: Two Philadelphia Arts Organizations Struggle with Debt Come...
NPQ has been chronicling the struggles of too many arts organizations which were affected by the recession in a very particular way. Here is what the pattern we have seen looks looks like.
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St. Paul Library Finds New Life as Home for “People’s History”
When a former Carnegie library moved its collection to a larger facility earlier this year, two professors—one a labor historian, one a theater artist—saw just the opening they had been looking for to...
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To Diversify, or Not to Diversify Revenue—(It’s Complicated)
Some conversations about nonprofits seem to have a life of their own, like the one about whether it is better for nonprofits to diversify their income bases or not. The answer is, “It depends…”
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Dynamic Governance: Kicking Employee Engagement Into Overdrive
NPQ has written a lot over the years about the value of engagement in the development of programs that creatively meet the needs of a community. In this story, employee and resident engagement are...
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Small Nonprofit with Repeated Deficits, Expands and Stabilizes
Many small nonprofit organizations are still suffering in the aftermath of the recession. Some have gone under or remain in uncomfortable financial straits, but others have been able to reorganize...
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House Guts IRS Tax Enforcement Budget; Nonprofit Sector Silence Is Deafening
It has been said that there really isn’t a problem of nonprofit accountability, but of regulatory oversight and enforcement of nonprofit standards by the IRS. If the U.S. House of Representatives gets...
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Why the Obama White House Says “No!” to the America Gives More Act
The America Gives More Act passed the House of Representatives this week. Just about every Republican who could find his or her way to the floor voted in favor of the proposed charitable incentives for...
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Report Shows Financial Contribution of Utah’s Community Health Clinics
Community health centers have grown a lot over the past few years, and they will surely grow more in the next few, so it is critical that they communicate the effect of their programs on communities....
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Nonprofit Retains Supporters while Coming Clean regarding Financial Impropriety
Just because a nonprofit experiences a problem with financial impropriety, it need not mean that it becomes a scandal. Some of the tenor of the response may live in the communications to stakeholders...
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Working out of a Financial Tailspin: Amistad America
It’s common for young nonprofits to create reputational problems for themselves by getting too much money before attending to the financial basics.
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Are There Too Many Nonprofits in Milwaukee?
A study looks at the growth and relative health of the nonprofit sector in Milwaukee.
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Social Impact Bonds: Phantom of the Nonprofit Sector
Sometimes the nonprofit sector appears haunted by the specters of unproven “great ideas.” Do social impact bonds fit in that category?
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Toward a Nonprofit Theory of Leadership and Organizational Culture
With all the talk about the need for “leaderful organizations,” few have set out to so clearly lay out a set of practices to create one. Leave it to MCN!
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Big Foundation Investment Produces Big Fail in a News Site
Proving once again that money doesn’t mean everything in nonprofit sustainability, a nonprofit investigative news site goes belly up in Santa Barbara.
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Met Opera Lockout Delayed as Both Sides Agree to Financial Examination
With a federal mediator and an independent financial analyst involved, Met management and unions have extended contract talks twice in recent days.
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Does McEnroe Charity Just Feed the Club that Holds His Tennis Academy?
An investigative article in the New York Post asserts that John McEnroe’s charity may be primarily a tool to prop up a for-profit business plan.
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