Hoi, At this moment I am researching setting up a Dutch chapter. Today I learned that it is possible for the Foundation to be earmarked as a registered charity in the Netherlands. There are several things that we have to comply with BUT, we have to consider if we want to go this route.
* The Foundation has to be benefit the common good in the Netherlands * The Foundation has to be an organisation that is truly active on a mondial basis * There may not be an organisation representing the Foundation in the Netherlands
As far as I can tell we comply with these. The assesment of Kennisnet of our importance of our projects for the Dutch educational system proves the first one. Our aim is to have resources in all languages, we do have projects supporting languages that can be found all over the globe, our contributors can be found all over the globe. This proves the second requirement. There is no Dutch legal entity at this moment associated with wikipedia.
We can still have a local chapter. The chapter would however not represent the Foundation.
When we go this route, we have to provide on a regular basis the yearly financial statements of the Foundation. Its bylaws should also be shown to the tax office.
Please give me feedback, is this something that we want. Is this something also possible in other European countries ??
Thanks, GerardM
On Friday, March 25, 2005 08:42 AM, Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com wrote:
At this moment I am researching setting up a Dutch chapter.
[Snip]
Please give me feedback, is this something that we want. Is this something also possible in other European countries ??
Yes, I think that having chapters in countries in the EU is worthwhile for two reasons - firstly, it helps with donations by providing a tax-relieved method of donating (at least, in some countries), and secondly, it helps foster a sense of community and belonging in the members.
Currently just France and Germany have chapters set up, but we are looking at setting one up for the UK soon-ish. Eventually we may want to form a Wikimedia Europe organisation to liase and so on at a larger level, but for now this will suffice.
One this that you may want to look out for is what exactly you can do whilst retaining the special tax status - for example, a UK chapter will not be able to merely blindly collect money for the main Foundation, but instead have charitable aims in and of itself (which might in practice not make a great deal of difference, of course - collecting money for international Internet-based education and learning projects vs. collecting money for the Wikimedia Foundation).
Of course, you will need to have a quite large group of people willing and able to put in the amount of work required to run the chapter, which I imagine is not entirely simple (especially if none of you have done this sort of thing before), and are able to stick with the chapter through the longer term.
Very best of luck.
Yours,
James D. Forrester wrote:
On Friday, March 25, 2005 08:42 AM, Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com wrote:
At this moment I am researching setting up a Dutch chapter.
[Snip]
Please give me feedback, is this something that we want. Is this something also possible in other European countries ??
Yes, I think that having chapters in countries in the EU is worthwhile for two reasons - firstly, it helps with donations by providing a tax-relieved method of donating (at least, in some countries), and secondly, it helps foster a sense of community and belonging in the members.
Currently just France and Germany have chapters set up, but we are looking at setting one up for the UK soon-ish. Eventually we may want to form a Wikimedia Europe organisation to liase and so on at a larger level, but for now this will suffice.
One this that you may want to look out for is what exactly you can do whilst retaining the special tax status - for example, a UK chapter will not be able to merely blindly collect money for the main Foundation, but instead have charitable aims in and of itself (which might in practice not make a great deal of difference, of course - collecting money for international Internet-based education and learning projects vs. collecting money for the Wikimedia Foundation).
Of course, you will need to have a quite large group of people willing and able to put in the amount of work required to run the chapter, which I imagine is not entirely simple (especially if none of you have done this sort of thing before), and are able to stick with the chapter through the longer term.
Very best of luck.
Yours,
Hoi, You miss the point of the my mail.
The point is that it IS possible to have the Foundation be registered in the Netherlands and in France as well (in principle as I understood from Soufron). This allows us to do collect money directly by the Foundation. It means that the monies collected can be used by the board as it sees fit. It means that we do not need a chapter to REPRESENT the Foundation..
With this potential being true for the Netherlands and other European countries, we can have local banking accounts, have tax exemption in so far as is possible under the tax laws of a country. Chapters exist as a backbone for activities in a country. Consequently we need less people to administrate all these efforts but we need a high quality administration to do this.
*Do we want to go this way. *Do we accept and understand the need for high quality administration. *What are the problems for the Foundation to go into contracts in the Netherlands and other countries. *Divorcing the chapters from the representation of the Foundation in countries.
Those are the things that are at issue. Whatever we choose it will have a major impact on our future organisation.
PS The need for a high quality administration is imho a given. At this moment many issues cannot be dealt with without the personal involvment of Jimbo. Jimbo does not scale he is a demi-God not a God. I am of the opinion that there is a need for a secretary to the board and some staff that do admin and answer all things that have an answer according to the policies of the board.
Thanks, Gerard
I'll throw my two cents here - I'm not sure yet, but I think the same could happen in Poland. We don't need to start a chapter, but we can register the Foundation. This will probably happen in many other EU countries, so this may be a very important thing to discuss.
Hi,
Le Friday 25 March 2005 15:55, Gerard Meijssen a écrit :
Hoi, You miss the point of the my mail.
The point is that it IS possible to have the Foundation be registered in the Netherlands and in France as well (in principle as I understood from Soufron). This allows us to do collect money directly by the Foundation. It means that the monies collected can be used by the board as it sees fit. It means that we do not need a chapter to REPRESENT the Foundation..
AFAIK, I don't think the Foundation could collect donations free of tax in France without being locally registred. That why we have set up a French chapter, who will be able to collect donations. BTW, the French chapter is also representing the Foundation in France. I don't know about other countries, where it could be different.
Regards, Yann
[...]
Thanks, Gerard
James D. Forrester wrote:
Yes, I think that having chapters in countries in the EU is worthwhile for two reasons - firstly, it helps with donations by providing a tax-relieved method of donating (at least, in some countries), and secondly, it helps foster a sense of community and belonging in the members.
Thirdly, tax deductions. Fourthly, tax deductions ;-)
Currently just France and Germany have chapters set up, but we are looking at setting one up for the UK soon-ish. Eventually we may want to form a Wikimedia Europe organisation to liase and so on at a larger level, but for now this will suffice.
I do hope we can make progress on this tomorrow!
(Without me being dragged *too* deeply into it. I've done my time with nonprofits and am entirely aware that being on the board of one and getting anything done can take up 36 hours of any 24-hour day, and I have way too many other things in progress ;-)
One this that you may want to look out for is what exactly you can do whilst retaining the special tax status - for example, a UK chapter will not be able to merely blindly collect money for the main Foundation, but instead have charitable aims in and of itself (which might in practice not make a great deal of difference, of course - collecting money for international Internet-based education and learning projects vs. collecting money for the Wikimedia Foundation).
Apart from a proxy farm, there will be things like grants to other UK nonprofits to do stuff or GFDL stuff; actively push the proposed Scots Wikipedia forward; help along the other smaller British-language wikis; provide a focal point to lure contributors for more British content. All those are just off the top of my head. (Someone noting all this down for tomorrow? I should be there 3pm-4pm ;-)
Of course, you will need to have a quite large group of people willing and able to put in the amount of work required to run the chapter, which I imagine is not entirely simple (especially if none of you have done this sort of thing before), and are able to stick with the chapter through the longer term.
Yep. "Raise your hand if you've been on a nonprofit before ..."
- d.
Diva wrote:
"Raise your hand if you've been on a nonprofit before ..."
:: lifts hand, arm, leg and one ear ... ::
More to the point, happy to offer self and skills for the purpose.
Alison
the same for me... :D
Cordialement,
Jean-Baptiste Soufron, Doctorant CERSA - CNRS, Paris 2 http://soufron.free.fr
Le 25 mars 05, à 17:25, VampWillow a écrit :
Diva wrote:
"Raise your hand if you've been on a nonprofit before ..."
:: lifts hand, arm, leg and one ear ... ::
More to the point, happy to offer self and skills for the purpose.
Alison _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
VampWillow wrote:
Diva wrote:
"Raise your hand if you've been on a nonprofit before ..."
:: lifts hand, arm, leg and one ear ... :: More to the point, happy to offer self and skills for the purpose.
/me tags VampWillow and runs away very fast ;-)
- d.
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