[Davisgig] City Staff Meeting Review + Davis Gig General Meeting Wed May 6th

[Steve McMahon]

Doug's point is very well taken, but I don't think it's a particular
problem as long as we're aware of it.

Most of what we need to do over the next many months will fall easily
within the terms of DCN's authorization letter from the IRS. Working with
DCN would allow the contributions that create educational and planning
materials to be considered deductible donations. If there is a balance
remaining in the account DCN keeps for community broadband after the city
decides to proceed, that could be used for all sorts of connected purposes,
like setting up the governance system.

If and when a parcel or bond is sent to the voters, Davisgig should form a
campaign committee (which is a lot easier than forming a 501c3) and do this
transparently, with all required filings. Contributions to the campaign
committee would not be deductible. That actually seems to me to be a very
nice division of financial labors.

Steve

On Fri, May 1, 2015 at 10:38 AM, Shneor Sherman via Davisgig <
davisgig at list.omsoft.com> wrote:

> I believe that anything more than 50% of "educational" is now sufficient
> in light of the IRS' issues with right-wing organizations last year.
> Shneor
> --------------------------------------------
> On Thu, 4/30/15, Douglas A. Walter via Davisgig <davisgig at list.omsoft.com>
> wrote:
>
>  Subject: Re: [Davisgig] City Staff Meeting Review + Davis Gig General
> Meeting Wed May 6th
>  To: davisgig at list.omsoft.com
>  Date: Thursday, April 30, 2015, 11:10 PM
>
>  Hi all. I
>  thought the items from the meeting with City staff were of
>  great interest, but I wanted to focus in on this:
>  On Apr 30, 2015, at 7:03 PM, Robert
>  Nickerson via Davisgig wrote:
>
>
>
>
>      Hi All
>
>
>  [snip]
>
>
>
>      2) General Meeting location TBA Wed May 6th, 6:30pm.
>
>
>  [snip]
>
>      Taking monies for our effort likely involves an existing
>  501c3 non
>      profit to act as a Fiscal Agent, be able to provide a
>  bank account
>      to tie our paypal donation button into and provide
>  receipts for
>      donations. It could be Davis Community Network, That
>  needs to be
>      discussed, a larger group, and, since we are not an
>  organizational
>      entitiy, someone aside from myself needs to be the
>  person to enter
>      into an Agreeement on DavisGig's behalf.
>
>  Okay, I
>  do think that this could be a productive direction. I want
>  to be sure everyone understands, though, that all money
>  donated to a 501(c)3 is "irrevocably dedicated to
>  charity," and can have NO mixing with an effort to pass
>  something in an election. Indeed, once a vote comes anywhere
>  close, a charity has to be very careful to desist from
>  educational efforts that might be misinterpreted as trying
>  to influence voters to make a specific decision. Yes,
>  there's a little bit of slop, but there's a good
>  reason that political pros have so many forms of PACs and
>  other organizations -- including 501(c)4s -- that are
>  structured so that they can accept donations and then work
>  on electoral issues.
>  So for what activities are we
>  soliciting donations, and when/how are we going to separate
>  "pure" education about muni gigabit fiber networks
>  from the political question of financing a public utility
>  that will construct such a network?
>
>
>
>      Around the Corner
>
>      5/6/15 Speaking about the project to the Progressive
>  Business
>      Exchange. Hopefully Ill pound out an  exciting 15
>  minute or so talk
>      on it that is reproducible ;)
>
>
>  Gee, that sounds like a fun thing to
>  do before a General Meeting!
>
>
>
>        --
>
>        Rob Nickerson
>
>
>
>        CEO
>
>        Om Networks
>
>        UCD Class of 96
>
>        C: 530-848-3865
>
>
>
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>
>  _______________________________________________
>
>  Please ref our wiki for
>  details, documents and contacts:
>
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>
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>  laid the train tracks, raised the bridges, picked the cotton
>  and the lettuce, built brick by brick the glittering
>  edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of.”
>  -- Elizabeth
>  AlexanderDoug Walter
>  • dawalter at dcn.org
>  • (home address)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>  -----Inline Attachment Follows-----
>
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