 Good morning and happy Friday, or I should say good afternoon, good evening, whatever time it is that you might be joining us for another episode of the non-profit show. Julia and I often share that Fridays, or I call them Fridays, might be one of our best days of the week that we enjoy because of the ask and answer. Thank you to Fundraising Academy at National University. Every single week we reserve the questions that come in day in, day out from you, our viewers, our guests that are here to join us in conversation. So again, Jack Alotto, I'm so glad to have you here, my friend. Jack is a CFRE. He's also a trainer and is with Fundraising Academy again at National University. We're going to have a lot of fun. I'm going to get super nerdy. You're going to get super nerdy. We're going to mentor one another and have a really good conversation. For those of you watching and listening, I'm Jarrett Ransom, your non-profit nerd and CEO of the Raven Group. So as we move forward, we of course want to give our gratitude because we are in so much joy to be in partnership with these presenting sponsors. So thank you to Blumerang Fundraising Academy at National University, Staffing Boutique, non-profit thought leader, your part-time controller, American Non-profit Academy, as well as the non-profit thought leader. These companies are here. They're supporting our conversations. They're supporting our platform, but I like to remind you that they're supporting you. So they are truly here to help you elevate your mission, do more good for those that you serve. And so please do check them out. There's really a great group of people. They also help us to produce, get this, Jack, nearly 800. That's 800 episodes. I know we are rocking and rolling, my friend. You can find them on Roku, YouTube, Fire TV, Vimeo, and our executive producer has been working on something else as an app. So you're going to start seeing that soon, which is really cool and exciting. You can also find us on podcasts. So anywhere you stream, you know, your entertainment, you could just say out into the ethos, the non-profit show, and it's like we show up. We're still working on that hologram, but Kevin, our executive producer, if you could work on that after the app, that would be great. Can you imagine Jack, us in hologram form? No, yes, I think that would be awesome. And Kevin is, he is the guy to do it. Kevin is the guy to do it. He does a lot. Hey, Jack, before we jump into these questions and you know how they work, you know, I'm going to read them aloud. I want to ask you to answer and provide some of your sage advice on them and then I will, you know, see if there's anything else to add to that. But for our viewers and listeners, would you please grace us with a little bit of your background and a little bit about Fundraising Academy? Sure. So I've been with Fundraising Academy at National University. I think going on three years, you know, I started early on when the pandemic was just starting and I watched that Fundraising Academy grow. We've got some more trainers. I know you've talked to a couple of our trainers. It's been a great journey for me. And as we were talking earlier, we mentor each other. In the Fundraising Academy, I learned as much from the cohort participants or our webinar participants as I hope I'm giving to them. This is a love affair in fundraising that we have. And I just think it's awesome. It is awesome. And hey, I would be remiss if we didn't mention Cultivate. So the conference is coming up June 1 in San Diego. Many of these trainers, many of the cohort and individuals, I myself will be bringing the nonprofit show. So go ahead and mark your calendar for June 1. Yeah. And you know, Jared, we're actually calling for sessions. Yes, thank you. So anybody who's, yeah. Yeah, that call presenters. So great. Yeah, reach out. I'm willing to work with anybody who's interested. I've said this before. Happy to help you organize your web, your abstract, whatever. Perfect. What a generous offer. I love it. All right. Well, we've got some questions. So we're going to dive into these questions right now starting with our first one that's come in from Carl in Pittsburgh. So Carl makes a statement and then provides a question here. Carl mentions that we are having some issues with understanding how, how to have the general public at our board meetings. Some of our board thinks that these meetings are private and not open to the community. Can you please help? I guess my first question is why do they feel they should be private? And that's a question, by the way, the donors are going to ask, why are your meetings private? Now, that's not to say that you cannot have executive sessions that are closed. Part of your meeting could be closed. Part of your meeting could be open. But one of the things that I, you know, you and I have talked about this many times, community centric fundraising, the people who are, you are your clients, your beneficiaries really should have not only be members of your board, but have access to talk to your board members. When you close your meetings, it's not, it's not very community centric. And the other thing I always like asking, what is the appearance here? What is the public or the press or your funders going to think if they hear that you've closed your meeting to the public? So I get executive sessions. You definitely should have executive sessions, but I like the idea of opening it to the public for them to come and see the work that you're doing. It really gets them involved. It's almost like a cultivation activity if you do it right. I love your point on this. And I'm so glad that you drove that home, Jack, is, you know, it's really about community centric and, and I'd like to remind everyone and Carl, your board and, you know, included is no one owns a nonprofit, right? It is created to provide solutions, help support resources to the community. And so I welcome stakeholders to, you know, provide that information from that community centric lens that you mentioned, Jack, and then you're right. Like, you could move into an executive session. So if there's anything that does need to remain, you know, private and even off public minutes, and that's another thing, right, is minutes, these board minutes could be reviewed, they could be accessed. And so really looking at how you might already have areas of entry for the general public, I would embrace this. And some states, you know, California has open meeting rules where if you're a nonprofit that is associated with a government agency, you must be open to the public. And I'm sure Pennsylvania, by the way, is my home state. I'm sure there might be some laws there or every state has different meeting rules around that and some actually do really want them to be open. That's a great point. So check with your state, you know, and for those of you that are across the globe, you know, this might change per state. So take a look to see what those requirements are as Jack just mentioned. So very valid. So Carl, we hope that that's helpful. We hope that this is shared with your board and that you can, you know, find a resolution that works. All right, name withheld comes to us. A donor has promised us to donate his home so that we can use it for a permanent facility. It is perfect in size and perfect in location. We will not take possession of the home until he passes. What are the legal steps that we should be taking now? Yeah, it's a great question and a very complicated question because it makes me have a lot more questions around this. So what this is is an example of a life estate agreement. So here are some of my questions. Are you getting ownership of the home today? Or are you getting the ownership after the person passes? Is it a deferred gift or is it immediate gift? How, you know, is it irrevocable? If it's a deferred gift, can that person get mad at Jack and say, I don't like that jackalotto guy anymore. So I'm taking this home back. Can they do that? Who pays for the maintenance, the insurance, the upkeep, the taxes, etc. This all has to be worked out in this agreement. Ask, you might ask, what was the current or past users of the house? Here's an example I had. Once someone wanted to give us a building, the charity will remain nameless. And we went, several of us went through the building. We toured it when we went to the basement. We smelled gasoline. And when I looked at the window, there was a dilapidated gas station. And I have a feeling that their tanks leak gas. We did not want that property. Has the property been contaminated by something? And I think this, all these questions say to me to our friend in Iowa, get an attorney. Get an attorney to help you make this decision about accepting this property. You have to look at a lot of factors. We've talked about examples of this as well, Jared. I'm sure you have plenty where someone wants to give you a piece of property in another state. It's an HOA property. And when you look through the agreement, and honestly, I've been offered properties in Texas. I'm in California. Like, I've never even been to Texas. I don't know where this place is. Should we accept it? Then you look at the agreement and it's an HOA property. You have 30 or 60 days to start construction on the house. You don't want your charity to be saddled with things that they can't really deal with. Yeah. All great points. I have an off the cuff question to you, Jackson. Curveball, get ready. I'm curious, you know, who makes these decisions? I'm very familiar with the gift acceptance policy. But who should be part of saying yay or nay? So that gift acceptance policy is where the board has, you know, has the responsibility of passing a policy in that policy. They say the types of property that they will accept artwork, whatever, how it is valued and who has authority to accept these gifts. So for example, the gift acceptance policy says, Jared, you have the authority to accept any stock transfer, but a property may require a higher level of deliberation. Maybe we have to get someone to go and evaluate the property. I've had this question asked and asked me many times by people. And it's this, one of our board members is an artist and they want to donate art to us. Well, guess what? I am not an art expert. I don't know what that art is worth. So and maybe the board member wants to inflate the price because they want to get a nice tax deduction. Don't do it. Have an independent evaluation of the property, the artwork, the motorcycle, the car, the house you're going to get whatever it is. Stock is pretty easy. Bonds are pretty easy. We can really evaluate them in the marketplace, but other things like that must be appraised by independence. I worked at a library foundation. And you know, I'm not a book expert. I don't know what the books are worth. So many donors would inflate the value of those books. And I, in my career, this has truly happened. The IRS has called me and said, hey, this donor thinks that they gave you $3,000 worth of books. And I would always say the same thing. I am not an expert at evaluating the value of books. Oh, that would have me shaking in my boots. No kidding. I remember working in an IRS office in San Jose called me and said, you know, how much these books were worth? We have this little slip from the library foundation, I would say. Not by me. Yeah, I don't look good in orange. I know orange is the new black, but orange would only look like orange on these. Gosh, well, yes, name with help, Des Moines, Iowa, a lot of information here, gift acceptance policy, appraisal attorney, all of those steps I think would help you do due diligence. And then I just want to add to this document, document, document, have this in writing, save it in your files, save backup in your files, you know, really just cover many bases for this. And then, you know, I always say leave that paper trail and I mean that electronically as well, because if and when this comes up in the future, you could say, well, this is how we handled it in the past. Yep. That's a great that that paper trail is key to so many things in life. Isn't it true. It is such. Well, hey, we're going from previously in your home state to where I am currently in my state Arizona so Shane and Tucson. Jack wants to know you are pro are you probably get this question a lot, but what is the average time that a board member should be voted on to the board. We have members that need to go. They've been on too long and we must get some new blood in our organization. Sounds like a fiery one. What do you say? Yeah. And here we go. You know, what do your bylaws say, what are the term limits that are outlined in the bylaws of your corporation or the articles of incorporation or whatever legal documents you have. I do like term limits. You know, I think that sometimes, you know, the, your organization becomes a self perpetuating work back to community centric fundraising. We want to involve we are changing in fundraising to this community centric model and I urge you guys to study this. Because here is where we start to think about the beneficiaries, the clients of our services to really having a say on the board to be part of the policy making part of the services that we provide to them. So it's really important that they're involved in that and if you have a board that's been there, the same people for year after year after year it's hard to get those new people on so I really do like term limits. I do too in my favorite I'm gonna, I'm gonna call it out for Shane is a three year term with another three year term in possibility with a one year break. So that's, you know, the possibility of six consecutive years, but in term limits of three years, another three years and then a one year break so I've seen that work quite a bit and I know that you've seen this as well Jack that, you know, there's a lot of boards that will say, Oh, I've been on for, you know, for 20 years or I've been the treasurer for 12 years and that to me is red flag. That's, that's not what we want to hear to me that that screams complacency it screams, you know, kind of just, I don't know just the same old same old and I agree with Shane you know having new blood fresh perspectives and connections to stakeholders and other civic groups I think, you know, it's beneficial. Yeah, and you know, you know what I would really recommend as we're in talking about boards is a board engagement form. This will outline for them, something that they signed at the beginning of the year. I'm going to donate this amount of money. I'm going to introduce you to this number of other prospective donors or foundations, or corporations I'm going to serve on this committee. I'm going to put this table up my gout at your gala. I'm going to be, you know, on this board for the next three years, whatever it is, board engagement forms and it really outlines specifically how their three years and then another three years, maybe the potential that second three years in your example, Jared will work. That is another great point I love having the engagement form. I love having that as a reminder, you know, to bring up and to share and then also to share out to the board. These are the accomplishments that you have made based off of that accountability. I think that's really solid to share as well. Okay, we're heading over to California. Yes, I know. I know this might be someone in your network Judith Arcadia. How often should someone from the development part department be making a report or engaging at board meetings. I think every board meeting. So let me tell you a story I actually this is a true story I actually got early in my career, a major gift officer job at a major university in the Bay Area. And the day before I was to start my job, I spoke with the director of development. And she said, Well, we have our board meeting tomorrow so I won't be able to welcome you to the network and I said, Well, let me come to the board meeting and she said, No, only I go to the board meeting. And I thought to myself, How could I be effective as a major gift organize officer, if I didn't have access to potential major donors. I look at this. I look at fundraising as a team sport. It's not just the major gift officer or the director of development or the annual giving manager. It's a team sport that must involve the board. And if they're not hearing about your success or your challenges, they're not going to be part of your team. So I am a person who believes that we should go to our board meetings. No matter what our role is, I mean, not everybody in the development department, but certainly the people who are managing major revenue streams and talk about their success and their challenges. I told you this example when I worked at a major hospital in Los Angeles. I was the foundation relations manager and I would bring a list of all of the foundations and all of their board members to the board meeting. And I must not list around and board members would say, Oh, I know this person. That's right. And that foundation. And one of those times, I was able to secure a $250,000 brand from a foundation that didn't typically give an ally. Because of relationships, right? That's the cornerstone of cost selling guys. Let me give an advertisement for relationship building. Build relationships with people and guess who runs foundations, people run them, guess who runs corporations, people run. Yeah, you know, I also would like to add to this Jack, you know, for the development director or again some major gifts officer someone in development to attend because the way they listen to board meetings are a little bit different than board members as well as potentially the CEO or executive director. So in my career, I've been to many a board meetings and have, you know, worn many a hats in that development title in that development role, and I would walk out with copious notes of potential funding opportunities. I heard this, I think that this is fundable by so and so I heard this need. I would like for us to approach X, Y and Z or a potential partnership for funding. So I love having a development representative at the board meetings, because they really do listen with a funding ear. Yeah, you know, I just read this morning this is this is true in one of our, whether it was CFRE or AFP, where somebody put forth a question where one of the board members said we, I could raise $250,000 or 300,000 can't remember what it was at a board meeting and everyone said yes, yes, yes, let's do it. And then what happened is they felt quite a bit short of that. Well, if the major gift officer or the corporate and foundation relationship manager isn't there, how are they going to say wait a minute, I'm not sure I we have the resources to raise that additional $300,000 from corporations or from individuals. So they have to be part of that discussion because they're closest to the work. And as you said, it's a team sport is a team sport. No, it's a team sport, fantastic questions, Jack, and fantastic answers. I love, you know, when we're able to share many pieces of our journey and personal stories you provided a lot of personal stories today that have tied into your, you know, career and your personal experiences. So Jack, a lot of CFRE trainer at fundraising academy. Please do check them out at fundraising dash academy.org. Tell us about the portal. Do you mind because my learning portal, my learning portal blogs and webinars and a whole bunch of information there. Here's the thing that I love to say because I get this question all the time. How do I get continuing education credits for my CFRE. I don't want to pay for them. We've got them. They're free, free, F R E. It's really important. Can I just say one thing? You know what next Friday is, Jared? What is next Friday? St. Patrick's Day. And guess who's going to be on with Julia Patrick? I think that's you. That's me. I can't wait. I mean, what better host on St. Patrick's Day than someone who has the name Patrick. I may change my name to Patrick for next week. Okay. Okay. Are you going to dress up as well? Oh, I'm going to wear green. You know, what do they say? Two types of people. The Irish and those who want to be Irish. I'm one of the one of these. I love it. Well, thank you for your sense of humor, your passion, your knowledge, your expertise. I love our ask and answer episodes. I mentioned this. And again, thank you to Fundraising Academy at National University for seeing the value in these questions and conversations for our friends across the globe. And I want to give another shout out of gratitude to our amazing sponsors that allow these opportunities, allow us this dedicated episode to address these questions. So thank you to Bloomerang American Nonprofit Academy, Fundraising Academy at National University where Jack is, and next week he'll be Jack O Patrick. And then non-profit thought leader, your part-time controller, non-profit nerd in staffing boutique. Please check these companies out. They are here for you and your mission, for you and your team, for you and your stakeholders, and those that you serve. So, you know, really just supported by a lot of amazing people. Jack, you are one of those amazing people. Happy Friday to you. Thank you. Yeah. Everyone have a great weekend. Absolutely. Recharge, rest if you're experiencing some weather. I hope that that all is well. And as we end every episode, we want to remind you to please stay well so you can continue to do well. Thanks everyone and make it a great day.