Donations and Sponsors

[Apache Bob]

I just read this entire thread.

A unit can sell popcorn, Christmas trees, wreaths, etc with approval of the Council office.

A unit cannot solicting donations of money from a business, orgainization, or person. Only a paid professional Scouter can ask for donations of money.

Food for thought?

[evmori]

I'm hungry.

 

But can a unit accept donations they didn't solicit?

[FScouter]

A Scout is thrifty. He works to pay his way and to help others. Paying your way with money you have earned gives you independence and pride. When you save your own money to buy a Scout uniform or something else you need, you learn the real value of those items. You will also be sure to take good care of them. On Scout campouts, you will learn to live comfortably with little more than the clothes you are wearing and the gear in your pack. Likewise, you can live other parts of your life simply and well, taking care of what you have and being generous to others.

-Boy Scout Handbook

 

The purpose of fundraising is a LOT more than getting money to buy things. HOW you get the money is more important that getting it.

[Beavah]

Yah, FScouter, those words are written for children in a manual for children, eh? It's fine to encourage lads to do work for those reasons.

 

But in adult society, we have different values, eh? We believe that scoutin' is worthwhile for society, and so we solicit funds for FOS. We take advantage of tax breaks and incentives as an organization, usin' our exempt status, rather than earning our own way and supportin' our nation with a corporate income tax. We provide camps and camperships, soliciting dollars and materials so that lads who would not be able to afford it can experience a full-featured camp. We run Scoutreach units, so that families who can't support scouting and scout volunteers can experience scouting.

 

Fact is, we as adults believe strongly that da proper role of an adult in society is to give back generously, to provide future generations with opportunity.

 

From public schooling to free and reduced lunch programs to laws limiting child labor, our values as a society are to provide for children, and through tithing or taxation to give to support the development of youth, not to make them earn their own way.

 

What would be odd is an adult society that didn't promote such values, or take such actions to provide for kids.

 

Beavah

 

[ScoutNut]

There is a big difference between a 501©(3) corporation like your local BSA Council soliciting funds and products and your local BSA unit which has no exempt tax status on it's own.

 

 

 

 

[Beavah]

There is a big difference between a 501©(3) corporation like your local BSA Council soliciting funds and products and your local BSA unit which has no exempt tax status on it's own.

 

Plenty of units have individual determination letters as 501©(3) organizations. Yah, and da the vast majority of Chartered Organizations which own and operate the units have such status. I reckon most cub packs fall underneath the limits so that obtainin' a formal determination letter is not required by the IRS anyways.

 

Can't see where it makes much of a difference in any event, as long as people are bein' honest.

 

Da values we espouse are to help others, especially kids. With our time, our talent, and our treasure. It's not the exemption which causes most scouters to pay for so much out of pocket, eh? Nor some odd view that a lad must pay his own way. Volunteers give because they care about kids. Same with donors. And carin' about kids is somethin' to be celebrated and encouraged.

 

Beavah

 

[Bob White]

Apache Bob writes "Only a paid professional Scouter can ask for donations of money."

 

That is incorrect. Units must sell a service or product, representatives of the Council may seek donations on behalf of the local corporation for the benefit of all units.

 

 

Beavah is of course incorrect.

Units cannot have a letter of determination making the unit a 501©3 as the local council is already the legal BSA corporation, not the unit. Only the unit's Charter Organization can seek 501©3 status and that does not give them permission to use the name or images of Scouting to seek donations. They can however accept donations that are offered them (the CO) and the donor can seek tax exempt status for the donation based on the charter organization's corporate status. But the unit must sell a council approved product or service.

 

 

 

 

 

[Beavah]

[Comments withdrawn as just not bein' worth da trouble, eh? ](This message has been edited by Beavah)

[Apache Bob]

Bob White - help me out.

 

Apache Bob writes "Only a paid professional Scouter can ask for donations of money."

 

Bob White writes "That is incorrect. Units must sell a service or product, representatives of the Council may seek donations on behalf of the local corporation for the benefit of all units."

 

Aren't you saying the same thing as I am? Units sell. Council seek donations.

 

[ScoutNut]

What he said was -

 

"REPRESENTATIVES of the Council may seek donations"

 

Not every representative of the council is a paid professional Scouter. Many FOS presenters and members of the various council committees, like finance, are unpaid volunteers.

[Bob White]

Scoutnut is correct. The vast majority of the people who make up the workforce of "the council" are volunteers working outside the unit level.

 

Your assertion Apache Bob that only professionals can seek donations is incorrect.

[evmori]

We is splitting that hair real fine!