Charitable Donations

 I have a rather surprising amount of IRA money that I am committed to donate to qualified charities before the end of 2021.  Also surprising is how difficult it is to extract the information needed to make such donations.  I've several times attempted, unsuccessfully, donate to the Caldwell County Historic Commission.  The same with the organization that restored and maintains the Lytton Springs Park.  There is a historic black high school on the east side of Lockhart someone is trying to preserve.  I imagine that the Caldwell County animal shelter is qualified.  I don't have time, energy, or inclination to pursue donations to these difficult charities.  

So, to my readers, if any, I ask you to identify and approach donation candidates.  Encourage them to submit "donation proposals" to wmckemie4@gmail.com.  Plain text only, please.  They should have "qualified" status with the IRS.  Which means they have EIN numbers.  IRS issued "Employer Identification Number", I believe.   As I understand, cemetery associations and other small civic groups are qualified and have minimal annual IRS reporting requirements if annual budgets are below $50k.   Proposals should be short and very informal but include organization name, purpose, history, recent budgets, EIN, amount desired, and whatever else they want me to know.

10/24/2021

I see that I should have specified that all email messages should have a subject that includes the organization name.  I make that request now.

I expect an acknowledgement from check recipients shortly after receipt.  A PDF attachment or plain text content of email should contain the name of the recipient, address, amount, date, confirmation of tax exempt status.   I may later add some boiler plate that should be included. 

I've decided that I'd rather have confirmations in PDF form attached to a message to the above email address.

10/29/2021

I'm surprised that it is necessary, but I add a synopsis of the information expected of those applying:

1) Submit via email only

2) Submit only to the email address: wmckemie4@gmail.com

3) Include the name of the requesting organization in the Subject: field of all messages.

4) Include in the message the full name of the organization to appear on a check

5) Include the full mailing address where a donation should be sent 

6) If there is some upper limit on the donation due to IRS reporting, please state that amount.

7) Provide a EIN and assure me of the not taxable status of donations.

8) I will assume the "From:" address of messages can be used for future communication if/when/as needed.

9) Please send no attachments. No photos or documents.  Please use plain text messages only.  If you have photos or other you'd like me to see, send a URL which I can follow to the remote item.

Additional information may be interesting and informative but the above information is crucial.  

11/10/2021

I see it is necessary to encourage those who wish to point others to use this post to us a URL rather than pasting the current blog post contents.  The contents may change over time.  As these few lines indicate.  Here is a "direct to this post" link:

https://wmckemie.blogspot.com/2021/10/charitable-donations.html

Please copy and paste the above link instead of the entire  and current post.

1/16/2022

Finally finished with this project.  I will likely be doing it again on a smaller scale later in 2022.  If you are a potential recipient, keep this site monitored.  Donations for 2021 totaled about $400k.  For 2022, they will likely be less than $100k.

I had some notable failures from organizations that were "shoo ins"  who did not apply and, consequently, received no donations.  All were notified to the limit of my patience.

1) Caldwell County Historical Commission

2) Whoever is trying preserve the old black school house in east Lockhart.

3) Kimble County Historical Museum

4) The Historical EV Museum (in Kingman AZ)

5) The people behind the Branson Colorado community park

6) Sons of Confederate Veterans