Charity Lawyer Blog

Donors often ask what happens if a charity takes a restricted gift and then uses it for something else. The charity is bound by the restriction, but the harder question is who can make it comply. In most states that has traditionally been the attorney general, not the donor. Whether a donor can sue depends on the state, and neither Arizona nor Washington has a statute that sa...

We wrote recently about the historical pattern of governments using tax audits, funding cuts, and stigmatizing labels against nonprofits they disfavor. That post was framed as a general pattern worth watching. This one is about a specific, current allegation that the IRS is targeting specific nonprofits for examination that fits squarely inside it.

One of the questions we hear most often from small nonprofits goes something like this, “our office manager has volunteered four days a week for two years, she loves the organization, and she has never asked to be paid. Is that a problem?” The short answer is that it can be. In this post we explain when a volunteer becomes an employee under federal and state wage laws, what t...

Back in April, we wrote about the IRS lifting its six-year moratorium on new group exemption applications. That post covered the basics.

We get some version of this question from almost every foundation and nonprofit board we work with, “[C]an we weigh in on a bill moving through the legislature, or fund a grantee that does?” The answer depends entirely on what kind of 501(c)(3) is asking. Public charities and private foundations play by different rules, and foundations that assume charity rules apply to them ...