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Welcome to the Nonprofit Partnership E-News
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May, 2010
This edition of The Nonprofit Partnership e-news is sponsored by Malin Bergquist & Co.
State Budget Update
Just as the dust has finally begun to settle after last summer’s 101 day state budget impasse, a much worse fiscal wind storm is about to knick up in Harrisburg that is expected to severely affect the nonprofit sector. This time there are likely to be fatalities. The consensus among Capital insiders, as well as, both chambers of the State Assembly is that passage of the Commonwealth’s 2010-2011budget will most likely linger past the July fiscal start date.
Unfortunately, revenue predictions for this year make the situation far worse. Estimates coming out of Harrisburg from not only the Senate and House, but also knowledgeable sources project the shortfall the Commonwealth is facing to be somewhere between $1.2 billion and $1.4 billion. According to Sharon Ward, executive director of the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center in Harrisburg in a recent briefing, nonprofits that depend in any way on state dollars should be extremely concerned. The forecast is the cuts will be deep and painful, with human service providers among the hardest hit. State Representative Dwight Evans has offered some relief. His proposed legislation, House Bill 2435 if enacted would raise about $370 million in the first year. The bill closes corporate tax loopholes, enacts a severance tax on natural gas production, places an excise tax on cigars
and smokeless tobacco, and closes sales tax giveaways that essentially hand sales tax revenues back to big national box store chains like Wal-Mart. There are also tax cuts and rate reductions to businesses that they have long sought.
However, that still leaves a sizable crater in the state gofers of between $800 million to over $1 billion. While some say state government still has fat to trim, the amount will not fill the enormous gap. The only place to look for cost savings seems to be in services, contracts and grant programs.
The House is scheduled to return on May 24, and vote on the legislation. Advocacy groups representing the interests of the nonprofit sector are urging agencies to voice their support of HB 2435. All agree that while it is only one part of the solution, passage of Representative Evans’ bill is an essential first step.
We Are All Futurists Now
Having just returned from a capacity-building conference in Chicago, there was considerable consensus that the world around us is changing and that we need to be moving at the speed of change. A keynote based on the research conducted by LaPiana Associates for the Irvine Foundation and presented in their study Convergence outlined five trends that are rapidly reshaping the nonprofit sector:
• Demographic Shifts Redefine Participation. The majority becomes the minority as the interests of those who are aging overwhelm those that are young.
• Technological Advances Abound. New advances are both revolutionizing workplace productivity and fundamentally changing the ways we socialize and interact with each other.
• Networks Enable Work to be Organized in New Ways. Since we are connected everywhere in both formal and informal ways, new alliances and configurations are always being shaped.
• Interest in Civic Engagement and Volunteerism is Rising. At once driven by concerns over the health of our planet and our communities as well as by a changed economy that is altering our previous conceptions of work and livelihood, help with our causes is everywhere.
• Sector Boundaries Are Blurring. Government is retrenching and more in need of our help. Business is more concerned with its social bottom line. Nonprofits are deftly navigating in the gap between, but the nature of these partnerships is changing.
To successfully navigate in this changing environment, LaPiana points to three management imperatives that will dominate our near-term future:
• Leadership Development. Especially shared leadership with the abandonment of hierarchical models.
• Strategic Thinking that capitalizes on the unique niche of nonprofits and what our organizations do best.
• Risk Tolerance. In a warp-speed world, we have to constantly define and redefine our comfort level with a changing notion of risk.
Here’s an Example- What’s Your Social Media Policy?
Don’t have one, you say. You are certainly not alone. The trends and changes discussed above offer an interesting exercise in the dilemmas faced by management in our brave new world. What is appropriate for staff to say about the organization on Facebook and Twitter? Can staff write about their work on personal blogs? Where do the personal and professional lines blur and where do they need to remain distinct? Who can speak on behalf of the organization on social media sites? Should we put personal information on official profiles?
The breezy informality of social media shakes the notion of a tightly managed and hierarchically controlled organization to its core. But what’s the choice? The world is changing and we have to change with it. For more on these issues, see www.nonprofitmarketingguide.com for an upcoming Kivi Miller webinar and mark your calendar now for the 10th Annual NW PA Nonprofit Day featuring Ms. Miller – October 21.
And While Your Calendars Are Out…..
It promises to be a festive and active summer in Erie. Through The Nonprofit Partnership’s relationship with Connoisseur Media, nonprofits will be able to host tables under the “Love Erie” tent during key events this summer. Use your table to educate, raise awareness, recruit volunteers, seek donations, and more. Revised available dates and events include the following:
June 25 Summer Festival of the Arts
July 9 Greek Festival
Aug 20-22 Celebrate Erie
Sep 11 Heritage Festival
And every Tuesday beginning July 6 and ending August 24 at Liberty Park – Eight Great Tuesdays.
To reserve your spot, please reply to this message, e-mail tnp@thenonprofitpartnership.org or call 454-8800 x 1.
Don’t Close Those Calendars Yet – Education Events You Want and Need
Three Deadly Data Backup Mistakes: How to Avoid Disaster at Your Nonprofit
Presented by Beth Burnside, Principal of CMIT Solutions, Erie.
Tuesday, May 25, 9:00 - 11:00 am at The Erie Community Foundation, 459 West 6th St., Erie.
In this session you will learn:
+ The most common data disasters and how to avoid them
+ Why one in five businesses loses their data every five years
+ The three questions every organization should be asking
+ How to evaluate your current system
+ The quickest and easiest way to secure your data.
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Putting Your Organizational Video to Work for You
with The Nonprofit Partnership and Greg Schlueter, Image Trinity and ErieAlity TV
Thursday, June 3, 9:00 to 11:00 am at Barber National Institute, 100 Barber Place, Erie
It's great to have that organizational video, but what has it done for you lately? Please plan to join us for this unique session that is part workshop, part showcase, and part introduction to an NPP grant program that will put a short, powerful organizational video to work for you on a specific task of your choosing. This workshop takes your organization's compelling story line and harnesses it to the power of video to create a product that gets the audience's attention and moves them in the direction you need them to go. In this workshop, you will:
+ Work to craft a compelling organizational story
+ See examples of how video stories reach audiences and move them to action
+ Learn how to deliver your video message in ways that reach your audience
+ Plan a specific campaign for volunteers, advocacy, donations, or some other goal
+ Roll it into an application to NPP to produce your video story and put it to work.
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Beware of Geeks Bearing Gifts: Essentials for Third Party Contracting
Presented by Jon D'Silva and Catherine Moodey Doyle, Attorneys with MacDonald Illig Jones & Britton, LLP
Wednesday, June 9, 9:00 - 11:00 am at Asbury Woods Nature Center, 4105 Asbury Rd., Erie
Nonprofit organizations often request or receive asistance from third parties to develop works subject to copyright such as brochures, educational materials, videos, artwork, advertising materials. websites, and the like. With these types of projects, it is very important for organizations to understand the basic principles of copyright law regardless of whether the third party is a volunteer or is compensated.
This presentation will provide a brief overview of the relevant provisions of the copyright act as well as point out common misconceptions which may lead to disputes over the ownership of these products. The session will also cover issues of ownership, protection, and confidentiality that are increasingly surfacing among organizations who are contracting to work together under collaborative grant funding, producing products that have common ownership.
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As always, please RSVP with your intentions to attend these sessions by simply replying to this message, responding via e-mail tnp@thenonprofitpartnership.org, or calling (814) 454-8800.
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