Raining on someone's parade (advice needed)

In My Humble Opinion
1

I want to run something by you guys that’s bothering me this week and get your humble opinions. The fact that we’re anonymous here is an advantage - it helps things be truly objective, I think.

So I rained on someone’s parade this week and while I feel 100% that I was in the right, I suspect that the way I did it was perhaps crude or poorly worded and offended people. So my big question is if there is a more gracious/diplomatic way to do what I did. Or if you do feel that I was being a ninny, you can say that too and explain why so that I can understand.

I am a volunteer treasurer for a small non profit animal rescue. The organization is fully volunteer, we all have day jobs to pay the bills but we’re all very passionate and dedicated to our cause. The organization functions entirely on donations, although my ambition (starting this year) is to start applying for corporate/philanthropic grants. With that goal in mind, I’ve been working hard to get the books in orderly shape, start documenting our successes, and have divided our mission goals into “projects” that need funding. When you apply for grants, the foundations want to see budgets, financial statements, goals and evidence of past success in meeting your goals. So all of this is background information: I take this volunteer job fully seriously and operate it like a professional would.

Early this week one of our large donors (past donations around $5000/year) sent us $10,000 by paypal. He then sent an email to our president saying that he didn’t like the way we run things and he gave the money with strings attached. He wants us to use the money to hire someone who will go to a dog training certification class, use that knowledge to better rehabilitate our dogs, and also take followup classes to keep his skills up. I have no problem with the strings attached to this donation. My problem is that he sent us the money and then communicated the strings without knowing if we would or even could agree to it. If we can’t commit to his requirements, we will need to refund the $10,000 - a LOT of money. If we do agree but for whatever reason the person we hire to do the training fails midway through or doesn’t do the followup, what then? I expressed these concerns in a reply-all to the board because I thought the donor’s email was forwarded to us all for discussion. I also commented that if we felt we could meet the requirements, I would like to see it written up in a contract reviewed by an attorney. I don’t want to accept such a large amount of money on what is essentially a hand-shake.

First my concerns were simply brushed off. Later I learned from one board member that someone else on the board didn’t like my tone. I was politely told to shut up. I feel like they don’t value my input on the board and am now thinking of resigning. But I don’t want to do anything rash, so I’m just waiting to see what they do with this donation and pondering the situation to figure out if I was in the wrong. The way I see it, being treasurer is more than just counting pennies. I have a fiscal responsibility because I sign my name on the IRS forms and grant applications. It’s my responsibility to speak up when I see something financially risky. If they don’t want to hear it, then they probably need to get another treasurer.

So, am I an asshole? Or was there a better way to raise my concerns?

2

Why would you need to refund the money if you decide not to comply with his requirements? You don’t have a contract with him.

3

You are way too close to the issue & too well invested. Your position is valuable and appreciated, but anyone can be replaced. Tread lightly, don’t resign.

As for the email? You’re fine; you did your due diligence by raising your concern to the leadership. They are on notice about it and any possible (INAL) issues with taking/using the money now fall on their shoulders.
Tone be damned; they’re just pissed because now there is a written record of the concern and they’ve gained accountability and lost deniability.

4

Very true. That doesn’t stop the donor from trying to sue us to get his money back in that situation. As I said, I’m thinking of risk. It’s a crap-ton of money.

5

Okay, I understand your point, thank you. Just to clarify: I am also leadership. It’s a small org and my position as treasurer is a board seat, so possible issues fall on my shoulders also. But yes, now we have my concerns in writing, so I have dropped the issue and told them I won’t reply any more if they continue to discuss it.

6

I think you were absolutely correct to spell out your concerns and agree with Count Blucher’s assessment that they’re pissed off.

Alas, a love of animals does not automatically translate into an understanding of the responsibilities of operating a non-profit organization. Hearing secondhand that someone “doesn’t like your tone” is not the sign of a mature, healthy organization.

If you’re the treasurer, are there other officers? Do you have by-laws and all that other good stuff? If you have a board, do they understand that the board’s role is not to be the hands-on worker bees, but to guide the organization through the kind of stuff you’ve just laid out – financial accountability, a clearly articulated mission, fund- and friend-raising?

I think a meeting is in order to discuss your concerns with the rest of the group/board. Your “tone” may be clearer when you’re face-to-face, and you may get a better feel for whether they’re brushing you off because they’re overwhelmed or because they are in denial. If it’s the latter, by all means, resign and, if you so choose, tell them you’re happy to stay on as a worker bee, but you don’t want the responsibility of serving as treasurer if the group/board isn’t all on the same page.

7

Legally, he can’t create conditions AFTER donating funds, so you are only bound to follow his request insofar as you want to make a good donor happy. In that context, your good faith effort to execute the dog trainer plan should be more than sufficient.

While you should consult an attorney (in most states you can get a 1/2 hour of advice for $40 or less through a bar referral service) in my state he would not be permitted to revoke the gift, even if you never even attempted to comply with conditions.

My old contracts professor used to say "the reason people hate lawyers is that they’re trained to reject the Optimism bias (cognitive bias of thinking “everything will work out”). You find yourself now in the same unfortunate place. Some people just don’t want to hear about the possibity that a situation can go bad. Animal advocates can be very passionate, which is sometime another word for insane. But if they are usually sensible people, perhaps a face to face discussion would smooth feathers and do a better job of letting them see that your only wish is for the sucess of the group.

8

If the donor wants to legally attach conditions to his donation, he can draw up a contract spelling them out and your organization may accept it, reject it, or propose modifications. It sounds more like he is making a request as to how his donation is to be spent, and that your organization intends to follow these instructions. If something goes wrong along the way, the money was still put toward his intended purpose, so what case could he have with no contract stipulating anything at all?

Bringing up your financial concerns was appropriate as treasurer, but deciding what to do is surely up to the board as a whole or the president. If your tone communicated that the donation may be a bad thing instead of a good thing, you may have come across as unnecessarily negative. No one likes the bearer of bad news, especially when the “bad news” is actually good news that has been reversed by a pessimistic twist.

9

Nope, the time to create conditions was before the money was given. Now he’s legally out if luck because you cannot impose conditions retroactively on money that’s already changed hands on a donative basis (nothing was asked in exchange). If he wants conditions he would have to give more money, and the conditions would only attach to the new funds.

Speaking legally. As I already noted there are non legal reasons you would want to make an effort to use the money as he revealed he intended.

10

Yes, legally, I agree, but if he now says he wants a contract signed, not cooperating would be rather dickish and would surely cut off future donations. This is a person who donates $5000 per year, so saying ha, ha we already have your money and will do with it as we please would be both dickish and dumb.

11

As said, he gave the money first, then expressed his wishes. Getting an attorney now to draw up a contract would put the organization in a worse position. Your advice in my opinion was flawed. That may be why the other board members are flummoxed with you. Also, these types of discussions are better done verbally at your meetings rather than on e-mail.

As it relates to your communication, if you’re gonna fold like a cheap tent, every time someone else challenges you, then you probably don’t need to be on the board. Board discussions are meant to have challenge back and forth. You raised issues, others have a right to do as well. Although back door conversations, such as you described that “someone else on the board didn’t like my tone” are not productive. If it can’t be said face to face, then it doesn’t really carry any weight. Blow it off.

12

As I said there are reasons to comply but there’s no point in drawing up a sham contract which wouldn’t be enforceable by either party but may confuse the parties into thinking they have a contract when they don’t. There’s already been plenty of
Miscommunication, no need to introduce more.

Either do what he wants or don’t, but sitting down to invent a unenforceable “contract” is a waste of time.

13

Welcome to the world of non-profit boards. You have a variety of people with different motivations, different work ethics, different pet (not the animal kind) interests, and different egos. You simply cannot please everyone on a board, and are bound to tick off some anytime questions are raised. It really is a difficult and thankless job. I think the OP did nothing wrong whatsoever in raising legitimate, reasonable questions, though I see no need to have any papers written up now, since the donor failed to ask for that upfront.

Someone on the board simply wants to accept the $10k and move on down the road without really trying to please the donor, or at least with no record of what steps should be taken. Yes, the donor didn’t really make his requirements known or conditional in the proper way, but it would be unethical (though perfectly legal) to take the money without making efforts to meet the donor’s wishes.

14

I said if the DONOR now brings forth a contract, NOT that anyone ought to. There is no reason to believe that the donor will do so. But if he does, agreeing to a contract and following it or giving back the donation would be appropriate, even though legally the organization could probably keep it. They plan to do as he wishes anyway, so there is both no current issue and no large threat of a potential future issue.

15

I think you did everything right, with good sound reasons.

We’re I you, I would send another note, to all the same people. Apologize for your tone, but such is hard to communicate in print. Ask them to try to understand that you take your responsibilities very seriously, but are ultimately interested in seeing your organization thrive and expand in future.

And to that end, you will always bring concerns about things you view as risky, to the attention of the board. Since they have decided your concern in unwarranted you’ll say no more about it, of course.

Then give them the option of finding someone less strident about their continued financial health, if such would suit them better. But, as long as you are charged with signing off on the finances you will continue to point out issues to the board as they arise. Then repeat, that it’s their call to make, which you will fully support, but don’t feel you should be faulted or silenced for fulfilling what you see as your obligation to the organization.

Then wait and see what shakes out. If you’re a volunteer, there’s a good chance they’ll back off, thank you for your service and apologize if you felt silenced, etc.

They want the money because they can do a lot of good with it. I’m certain that’s what they were reacting to.

Good Luck and please keep us updated as to what action you take if any, and their response.

16

Lots of good feedback. I don’t see a multi-quote* button here, so let me quote the hard way a few things that I want to respond to:

Absolutely right in that first paragraph. Like-minded but otherwise unqualified people come together and form an organization: small non profits in a nutshell. It’s set up as a board of trustees, nobody has a title except for me. Even the woman who founded the organization, although I consider her the president, doesn’t go around proclaiming herself as president or anything. I kind of like that, it keeps the egos down, and reinforces that we are a democratically run board. … for the most part, until you piss people off! LOL!

Also, we are what is called a “working board” rather than a “governing board”. That’s pretty common in small grass roots nonprofits, which is what we are. As we grow, I expect that we’ll turn more and more work over to volunteers while we focus more and more on just governance. The big assumption there is that we will grow rather than explode in conflict like I’ve seen happen to another similar organization. (This is my second ride on this pony, and I seem to be the only one who has bothered to read anything about how to run a nonprofit or manage volunteers or anything.)

Yes. My feeling is that they saw all the zeroes and cash register noises started ringing in their heads and they didn’t want to hear any voice of reason. When I mentioned writing up a contract, I was trying to explain how donations of that size SHOULD be handled. They didn’t get it, apparently, just thought I was throwing my weight around. Basically I think a donation of that size is really a grant. I did tell them that I absolutely want us to keep the money but we needed to take the donor’s requirements seriously and honestly evaluate whether or not we could comply with them before the money was transferred from paypal into our bank account.

Thank you, I like this tough approach, even though it’s directed at me. One thing that’s probably not apparent is that the donation came through minutes before the donor’s email did, and our discussion occurred minutes after that. We are a geographically dispersed board and most communications are handled by email. I was trying to throw a yellow card before the money hit our bank account, just to get people to stop drooling over the zeroes and stop and think for a minute.

In fact, immediately after I sent my concerns, the “president” replied back saying that she has transferred the money from paypal into our bank. That looked suspiciously to me like she jumped to get the money moved before I could log into paypal and hit the refund button - not that I would without board discussion, so that demonstrates a huge lack of trust. I told her so in a private email, so she then moved the money back from our bank to the paypal account again.

I agree that board discussions are meant to have challenge back and forth, so that’s why I was surprised that they told me to shut the hell up. I seem to have upset their poor widdle feewings. Actually with people like that, I don’t think any attempt to debate would help them to turn off the egos and discuss in a rational way.

By the way, we still don’t know if we can comply with the donor’s requirements. There is a language barrier between the donor and the person who can follow through with the requirements (runs the shelter). The shelter manager said he doesn’t understand what the donor is asking for. I already said I would stay out of it, so I assume someone else will clarify for him.

(* Oh, now I see it. I must not have been logged in before. Sorry!)

17

As you mention wanting to get into grants to help fund your organization, this experience is an ideal example of the difference between grants and donations.

Were the $10k a result of winning a grant, 1) the conditions (attached strings) would have been spelled out at the time you were applying - not when the grant was awarded, 2) significant details like timeframe for the conditions to be enacted, and schedule/means of auditing to see that these conditions were being addressed would also have been spelled out in the grant.

Your e-mail expressing your concerns were all very valid had this donation been an award from a grant.

But, it wasn’t. This was a “donation” and the “strings” can be looked as “wishes”, but really the donor has no leg to stand on in terms of “enforcing” that his wishes be met.
Which brings us to the board’s reaction to your e-mail (not liking your tone). As with most non-profits, huge donations are a blessing. And likely, in recognizing the “strings” were by no means any “contractual obligation” (over which you could be sued for non-compliance), a smart board/president would respond “sure, we’ll be happy to comply with your wishes. (keep those checks coming).”
There may be some effort to look into complying, or there may not. And they may even give some lip-service to the donor to let them know “effort” is being put into addressing his wishes. There is always the “we’re looking into it, but the search is taking longer than we had expected” excuse.
But the (smart) board/president knows that when there’s no real obligation, there are many ways to deflect the wishes (“we were looking into hiring that trainer, but then we were swamped with an influx of sick animals right when the plumbing went out, and so we needed to use the money to handle that”). Or simply put, the board/president can decide the priorities on how to use the money.

The issue with your tone was one of “maybe we shouldn’t accept this donation because of the ramifications of these ‘strings’”. And no board/president would turn away a donation (not just because of the donation itself, but it will also discourage that donor from attempting to donate in the future).

What may help is to really simplify the situation: a donor gave your organization this big chunk of money because they want to help.
If you think your organization will not use the money to “help” your organization, then you have some real ethical issues to deal with.
But if you think your organization will use the money to help, then the “how” is really a matter for the board/president - not the donor. Again, simply put: a donor gave you money to “help”, your organization will put that money to good use that will help.

18

Oh, that’s a good explanation. I was trying to handle a donation as if it was a grant, you’re right. Apparently all the zeroes dazzled me, too, but I responded by going ultra-conservative.

Are there other differences between grants and donations? One is applied for (formally, with documentation) and the other is either unsolicited or casually requested?

19

Taking the money without consulting the donor is stupid as there will be no future 5 or 10K checks if you do this. Has anyone had an IRL face to face talk with the donor to clarify the parameters of what he wants done and what is possible?

Re

IMO $10,000 will not come close to the real world cost of actually hiring someone as a trainer then paying for their training and certifications. At this point you are becoming an employer with all the attendant responsibilities. If you do what he wants you’re taking on a huge, long term responsibility.

You can sub-contract the work out to a certified trainer, but it’s still going to quickly chew up every bit of that $10,000 if they are handling and training multiple dogs. They only way this will work is if a volunteer gets certified, but then you are completely dependent in them staying and working for free after they get licensed/certified.

You need to get a handle on what is acceptable to the donor.

20

TONS of differences. So much so that when you get into grants, you will also want access to an attorney, if for no other reason, to help with clarifications.

Donations can be looked at as “money from the skies”. Unpredictable in frequency and amount. And, as discussed, no strings attached.

Grants can have stipulations and conditions up the wazoo, and tend to be more specialized, focused. In your situation it may state something like “to be used for ‘shelter’ only”, so that may include housing and food, but may not include vet bills (I’m making this up).
Grants may also be paid out lump sum (and then you re-apply next year/period), or they can be dolled out over a number of years.
There is almost always some reporting involved with grants - showing how, how much, and when you spent the grant money. So you definitely need to have your accounting system in place before you start dealing with grant money.
The flipside to the unpredictability of donations is that you are likely in competition with other non-profits when it comes to applying for grants. Also applying for grants can require significant effort, and since you don’t win all of them, some of that effort is for naught. (the good news is that many grants ask for the same info, so once you get the “first” one done, you can start cutting and pasting a bulk of information from one application to the next). You will want to weigh how much effort to put into applying for a grant with whether the effort is worth it.

Back the “focused” aspect of grants: you will want to be careful about “adding”/changing your mission as you pursue grants. For example, there may be some huge grant, but it must be used not only for “animal shelter”, but also for, say (again, I’m making this up), “community education on animal care” or something. So by accepting this grant, you are no longer “just” a shelter, but are now responsible for setting up an education program. Grants start to get more and more tempting, and there is more and more willingness to “extend” your services in order to win some grants. If you’re not careful, you will be running an animal shelter and doing quarterly spay and neuter clinics !
Likewise, after having won that grant for “shelter and community education”, once that grant expires, and perhaps you don’t renew or apply/win it again, you’re now left with this (no longer funded) education program. So you may have to let those people/that program go.