Resources You Can Use
Legal Question of the Month with Staff Counsel Remy Barnwell
Question: What are we legally required to have/follow in relation to expenditure responsibilities? Especially for grants coming from donor-advised funds.
Answer: The legal requirements of expenditure responsibility can be found in section 4945(h) of the Internal Revenue Code. It clarifies that the foundation is responsible to exert all reasonable efforts to establish adequate procedures to see that the grant is spent solely for the purpose for which it was made, obtain full and complete reports from the grantee on how the funds are spent, and make full and detailed reports regarding the grants to the IRS.
Expenditure responsibility is a requirement for all grants from donor advised funds to noncharities. Although distributions from other fund types to noncharities don’t face the same legal requirements, it’s a best practice to adopt a due diligence policy which you can think of as “diet” expenditure responsibility or expenditure responsibility “light.” With any grant to a noncharity, no matter the fund type, you want to be sure that the assets are used solely for the agreed upon charitable purpose.
Council members are encouraged to send any legal inquiries to legal@cof.org.
Leading Locally 2025 Early Registration Deadline: Next Friday, February 28
There's just one week left to save on your Leading Locally 2025 registration. Connect with over 1,000 community and place-based funders in Minneapolis-St. Paul this June to learn and share with colleagues from around the country. Make sure you can attend at our lowest rate by registering by next Friday, February 28! Register for Leading Locally 2025 today!
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CF Insights Highlight
Coming Soon: FY23 CF Insights Annual Survey Results
Representing the growth and operations of hundreds of community foundations, the latest CF Insights Annual Survey Results will highlight year over year changes in assets, fundraising, and grantmaking, the asset compositions of community foundations of different sizes, donor-advised fund activity relative to other fund types, and more.
If your community foundation is a member of the Council with the Plus Membership add-on, you don’t need to wait for the publication of these results. Sign in to the CF Insights benchmarking platform and run reports featuring this data, anytime. Visit cof.org/cfinsights or email cfinsights@cof.org to learn more.
New Publication: Coming Together, Not Apart - Part 2
The second report in our Coming Together, Not Apart publication series is a deep dive into the actual work philanthropy is doing today to navigate divides, training a spotlight on five real-world initiatives to examine the theories of change behind these efforts, describe how the work is playing out, and explore how impact is measured to determine success.
Download the report for free to see how fellow community foundations are engaging in connecting and collaborating across differences.
SDG Learning Circle for Foundations
Are you working on advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) or open to learning more about how the SDGs can fit within your work?
You're invited to our monthly peer learning circle, where we discuss SDG hot topics including education, local implementation, community alignment and communication, professional development, data, grantmaking, and more. Register for our next session on March 18!
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