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As we head for a changing of the guard in Washington DC, the Obama government will take over a country facing its toughest economic challenge since the Great Depression.  Nonprofit staff and boards are worried as an impending financing challenge awaits the nonprofit sector in the coming year as donations, foundation grants and state funding are cut. Despite this perilous situation and despite having a huge role in the economy, the nonprofit sector is largely missing from the public discourse on the economic crisis. Nonprofit professionals and board members need to ask why we are not part of the conversation and how we ensure that our interests are going to be heard in public policy decisions that affect the sector.

Why the Nonprofit Sector Must Speak Up

Last week I was a speaker at the Boston Fundraising Summit, sponsored by the Center for Nonprofit Success. My session was focused on how to conduct successful research in the search for funders. Here is a listing of resources I prepared for the summit that may be helpful in your own work. Good luck!
Provided Free of Charge:
Guidestar (www.guidestar.org) - obtain IRS 990 forms for every nonprofit, including foundations; also lists board members
Grants Management Associates (www.grantsmanagement.com) - manages many local foundations and provides application guidelines
Bank of America Philanthropic Services (www.bankofamerica.com/philanthropic/grantmaking.action) - provides a searchable database of about 70 foundations for whom Bank of America is the trustee, co-trustee or agent.
Philanthropy News Digest (www.foundationcenter.org/pnd/rfp/) - sends weekly updates on new RFP's and has a searchable online database of RFP's
Association of Small Foundations (www.smallfoundations.org) - has a list of members organized by state, many with direct links to the foundation website.

As 2009 approaches, it’s high season for annual appeal campaigns, and with the economy in a recession, these donations become absolutely more critical to keeping organizations going. It’s fairly common to see in these appeal letters or in an annual report, a chart or graph that captures and states the amount to which a donor’s contribution goes to direct services. This is usually done in response to the general desire from donors that every dollar go to providing services and not to operational infrastructure.
The question that agencies are compelled to answer is, “How much of my money goes to supporting services?” But the question itself, and answer to it, tells the donor nothing about how effective the organization is in delivering services or the impact it has in meeting social problems. The question also demonizes overhead, as Dan Pallotta, a writer and blogger about nonprofits and philanthropy says, “when in fact ‘overhead’ is what's required to build the infrastructures we'll need if we ever really want to solve the huge social problems.”

Change is in the Air: The Economic Crisis Affects Everything
The economic crisis is challenging long held assumptions in all the facets of our lives. After a lost decade in the financial markets, retirement portfolios are no higher than they were before the dot com boom and bust. The real estate market has likewise reduced wealth challenging the notion that homes are a means to middle class wealth. Higher Education is seeing significant reduction in their endowments and beginning to realize that the rate of increase of tuition over the last three decades is now putting education out of reach for many in the middle class. Similar unsustainable inflation rates in the health care industry will almost certainly require significant austerity measures in the next few years. Despite the growth of the health care industry, it fails to cover 47 million Americans with insurance (and perhaps many more as a result of the recession.) Universal health care insurance is almost assuredly on its way. The spike in oil prices and the change of consumer behavior provided what could be the final nail in the coffin for the American auto industry.

When I visited Bangalore, India, during the summer, I got an opportunity to visit 3 different non-profits and spend considerable time with the leaders of the organizations. Each of these organizations was founded by very passionate people who in all cases could relate very closely with the issues that the organizations’ constituents were facing and have grown considerably since their inception. I found many similarities between the challenges that these organizations faced and the ones that I commonly see within non-profits in the U.S. But I also saw a very important difference between what I saw in India and what I see in the U.S, which I hope to uncover in this blog.

I recently came across two articles that caught my attention, both having to do with utilizing the internet for fund raising.  We all have questions like, "How effective is that online donation button we have on our website?"  "Are the elderly, often the target population of a giving program, comfortable with going online to make their charitable gifts?"  "What are some innovative approaches to raising money online?"