| Newsgroups |
gmane.politics.marxism.analysis |
| Message-ID |
<[email protected]> |
I did not see my post as in any way other than friendly. But in my work with drug user activists, for example, the have been two or 3 occasions when I have seen people go 503 3 c so they could get the donations without fully realizing what they were giving up.
And it hurt them later on
By the way, I am on a big 5 week work related trip and my fist hotel has strange email so my messages may sometimes get chopped
-----Original Message-----
From: Hunter Gray <[email protected]>
To: Bear Without Borders <[email protected]>
Cc: Redbadbear <[email protected]>; SycamoreCanyon <[email protected]>; marxist <[email protected]>
Sent: Thu, May 16, 2013 4:23 pm
Subject: [marxist] Friendly clarification re my "Not for profits"/Native values
Actually, Sam, I preceded the main body of my post this morning with this:
"First, as we all know, there are a vast number of organizations -- many of them social justice advocacy -- that do not formally incorporate and seek 501(c)(3) status and depend on voluntary financial contributions and other versions of their own fundraising. Foregoing IRS "certification" does, at least in some cases, enable maximum freedom of operation."
Virtually all of the social justice organizations I've helped people organize, and there have been many, have never sought 501(c)3 status. All of them, however, have had a basic and elected body of officers and usually a committee structure. A few, more institutionalized in nature -- e.g., "Native American Publication" -- have had board members. We are not anarchists. (And I certainly don't get the impression you are!) Occupy, for example, would have done well to have had at least a rudimentary structure with elected officers and some stable committees.
Our Training Center was not a community organization in the usual sense. It was essentially an educational institution in its own way. On the other hand, in the course of their training and thereafter, trainees often organized advocacy groups, mostly around specific issues. (Some trainees, however, went to work for existent Native programs or for their tribes back home.) I don't recall any of the trainees ever seeking 501(3)(c) status in their own right. (The Training Center itself, and some trainees, did develop a spin-off community health outreach quite apart from the Center. I helped that get 501(c)(3) since state funds were involved.)
Just clarifying -
Best, H
HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /St. Francis
Abenaki/St. Regis Mohawk
Member, National Writers Union AFL-CIO
www.hunterbear.org (social justice)
See the new expanded/updated edition of my "ORGANIZER'S
BOOK." It's the inside story of the rise of the massive Jackson
Movement -- careful grassroots organizing, bloody repression, sell-out
and more. It also covers other organizing campaigns of mine through
the decades since Mississippi. It's replete with grass-roots organizing
examples and "lessons." And it has my new 10,000 word
introduction. Among a myriad of positive comments and reviews:
". . .a local activist's important account of the deleterious effects
the involvement of national organizations can have on indigenous
protest movements." (Historian David Garrow.)
http://hunterbear.org/jackson.htm
See the related: http://crmvet.org/comm/hunter1.htm
Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father]:
http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm