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Archive for September, 2009
California Financier to Start Nonprofit Journalism Project
Sep 25th
A wealthy San Francisco financier is putting up $5-million to start a nonprofit journalism venture that could offer stiff competition to the Bay area’s struggling dailies, reports the Associated Press.
Warren Hellman said the project was prompted in part by reports that the Hearst Corporation planned to sell or close the San Francisco Chronicle.
The organization will employ a full-time staff and share news coverage with local public-radio station KQED. It is also “fairly far along” in talks to provide material to The New York Times, Mr. Hellman said.
U.K. Regulator Dismisses Claim Against Prince Charles’s Charity
Sep 25th
Britain’s charity watchdog agency has dismissed a complaint charging that Prince Charles used his architectural charity for political lobbying, the Press Association reports.
The Charity Commission said it accepted assurances from trustees of the Prince’s Foundation for the Built Environment that they were not pressured by Prince Charles to intervene in a London planning dispute. An antimonarchy organization had filed the complaint after the owners of a major residential development withdrew a planned modernist design the prince had criticized.
BBC News reports that Charles’s sons have expanded their charity work. The Princes’ Charities Forum, founded by William and Harry three years ago with a handful of organizations, now meets twice a year and has grown to 20 members that receive patronage from one of the princes.
In the Arts: Strapped L.A. Museum Raises $60-Million; a Charity Concert in Israel Spurs Controversy
Sep 25th
The Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art announced Thursday that it has raised $60-million since December, an achievement officials hailed as evidence that the downtown institution is rebounding from financial straits that led to layoffs and canceled shows earlier this year, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The figure includes $30-million pledged by the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation in December, when the museum’s dire situation became public. The museum also announced that two disgruntled trustees who quit in the fallout from the financial crisis have returned to the board.
In other arts news, The Washington Post reports on the controversy over the iconic singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen’s concert in Israel Thursday to raise money for a charity he founded to support groups promoting Israeli-Palestinian co-existence. Groups opposing Israeli policies in the West Bank and Gaza have called on international artists to boycott the country.
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Prospecting: Who Gives the Most Online?
Sep 25th
A Washington suburb has the most-generous online donors, according to a new study reported in Prospecting, The Chronicle’s fund-raising column.
Turn Design-on-Demand Into Profits
Sep 24th
These startups are proof positive that there's money in customized products.
Bond Debt Adds to Nonprofit Groups’ Financial Woes
Sep 24th
The New York Times reports on the wide range of nonprofit organizations struggling with debt, largely from issuing tax-exempt bonds during fatter times.
More than twice as many charities issued such bonds in 2006 as in 1993, mostly to finance property and construction projects. Debt linked to those bonds rose from $98-billion to $311-billion during that period, adjusted for inflation, weighing down organizations ranging from major universities and arts institutions to tiny social-service providers.
The Nonprofit Finance Fund’s chief, Clara Miller, called the debt “the fourth horseman of the nonprofit apocalypse.”
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Update: Acorn to Sue Guerrilla Videographer
Sep 24th
Acorn will file suit in Maryland on Thursday against the conservative activist who filmed local staff members of the national community-organizing group apparently offering advice on prostitution and tax evasion, reports The New York Times.
Acorn contends James E. O’Keeffe III and others associated with making and publicizing the hidden-camera videos illegally recorded the staff members without their consent.
Fallout from the footage continued Wednesday as the Internal Revenue Service announced it was cutting ties to Acorn, which had been among groups approved to offer free tax preparation. Acorn said it had already written to the IRS on Monday to withdraw from the tax program.
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