Task | Assigned | Due | Details |
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Identify options for international non-profit structure | Tax deductibility for donations to charitable organizations varies by country and traditionally has required a local legal entity for each country. We’d like to explore if there are alternatives to creating entities in each country, or if there are alternatives ways to setup and administer multi-jurisdiction legal entities. Answers required for the following questions: - Is it a requirements to setup legal entities in every country in which we’d like to accept donations? - Are there options to help us scale accepting donations from multiple questions, even when creating multiple entities? - Are there entities that would allow us to accept donations from multiple jurisdictions? - If we were only able to setup a few legal entities, which ones would make the most sense (eg what’s the 80/20 solution)? | ||
Identify qualifying non-profit purpose options | Registering as a tax deductible no-profit generally requires a clear “charitable purpose”. Previous applications to become a charity in the United Kingdom were refused due to the lack of a compelling public charitable purpose. We need to identify our story around a charitable purpose, and how to meet the requirements of specific jurisdictions. Answers required for the following questions: - What are our options for stories around Sandbox’s charitable purpose, either covering existing organizational activity or potentially new activities? (eg make Sandbox Skillshare public and offer it as a public good) - What are the requirements for various relevant jurisdictions (how do the requirements vary form the US, Canada, UK, EU, etc) and how likely are we able to meet for each? | ||
Identify potential endowment partners | There are a variety of charity, foundation, and endowment management organizations that will help support the creation and management of endowments. We should explore working with them and better understand the benefits, costs, and requirements. Answers required for the following questions: - Interview a number of potential organization partners to better understand their model and what it would mean to work with them - Identify general costs associated with working with these partner organizations - Identify what kind of support they would be able to offer in either setup or ongoing management - Identify what requirements they have for the organizations they work with (ie, do they require we already have a legal entity, or would they be able to support us in setting one up?) - How do they work with different legal jurisdictions / countries? | ||
Identify potential software platforms for charity / foundation management | Increasingly there are new software tools to help support charities in managing their organizations. We’d like to get a better sense of the landscape of opportunities and which might help us in running a Sandbox charitable organization. Answers required for the following questions: - Create a list of relevant software tools and platforms - Explore what benefits, costs, and requirements they involve, including reaching out to relevant providers to better understand their model - Identify what jurisdictions they support - Identify any integrations or options for collecting donations and performing reporting - Identify any options that would specifically support the running of an endowment within a charity | ||
Identify potential fiscal sponsorship organizations | Some charities do not operate as their own legal entity, but rather operate under an umbrella organization that “sponsors” them with their charitable status. The benefit of such an arrangement is that Sandbox would not need to create or manage its own legal entity, but rather all administrative work would be done by the sponsor organization. Fiscal sponsors have a variety of models, but general have a certain set of requirements, may require alignment of organizational/charitable purpose, and take a fee of overall donations. Answers required for the following questions: - Generate a list of potential fiscal sponsors that may be a good fit - Explore what benefits, costs, and requirements they involve, including reaching out to relevant providers to better understand their model - Identify any organizations that might be able to offer international support and what countries they are able to operate in | ||
Begin planning for fundraiser rollout | Our plan is to announce our fundraising effort at the Global Summit in February and to do this as part of a 10 year decennial celebration of Sandbox as a self run organization. We’ll need to begin coordinating with the summit team for how best to integrate this into summit programming for maximum impact, both including messaging and programming around donations and also the decennial. We’ll also want to explore pre and post summit communications to fully capitalize on the momentum. | ||
Identify platform for accepting donations | We’ll need to pick a set of tooling to accept donations at the summit and after. We’ll want to explore what are the best options and how they might integrate with other software platforms for endowment / charity management. | ||
Legal review | Provide legal review of any agreements | ||
Work with the board to identify any approval or reporting requirements | |||
Look at options for donations within our existing entity? | Yatan Blumenthal |