Harnessing the Power of Public Policy

Resource
Power in Policy: A Funder's Guide to Advocacy and Civic Participation

Contents
This Issue's Free Tool: Legal Rules for Policy
    A private foundation may...
    A community foundation may...

Additional Legal Resources
To Learn More

From Vince Hyman, Publishing Director, Fieldstone Alliance:

TOO OFTEN, the nonprofit community sits silent as powerful and selfish interests shape decisions that impact the lives of the people we struggle daily to help.

• Some foundations, whether out of ignorance of the law, fear of taking a stand, or lack of know-how forego the opportunity to take action.

• Our board members, with the best of intentions, tie our hands when it comes to a key strategy for accomplishing our mission: shaping policy and regulation.

• Our executives, management, staff, and volunteers, exhausted by their daily challenges and unaware of the powerful tools legally available to them, miss the opportunity to change the policies that continue to generate new problems.

Yet it is our legal right, it is our privilege, and it is our duty to shape the policies that govern our lives, the nature of our organizations, and most importantly, the lives of the people we serve.

Sustainable change requires three elements: action, education, and policy. Public policy work not only prevents problems from getting worse, but also protects the progress made through action and education.

This month, with our friends at Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, we're releasing Power in Policy: A Funder's Guide to Advocacy and Civic Participation, edited by David F. Arons.

With a foreword by Hodding S. Carter III, an introductory chapter by Emmett D. Carson, Ph.D., and contributions from leading foundation heads, practitioners, and legal experts from across the country, the book calls foundations and nonprofits to action.

Power in Policy was written to influence the staff and leaders of foundations. But it's also a great tool for nonprofits that are trying to make the case for advocacy with their program officers.

The contributing authors provide many examples and direct instruction on how to incorporate advocacy into philanthropy.

The book answers a slew of questions including, "How does my foundation assess various risks?" "How do we organizationally prepare for public policy work?" "How do we develop partnerships and advocacy strategies?"

Also included are rich case stories of how private and community foundations large and small foundations are meeting their missions through public policy and civic activity.

This Issue's FREE Tool: Legal Rules for Policy
This issue we provide you with a summary of legal rules for private and community foundation involvement in public policy and civic activity. It's derived from Power in Policy, Chapter 9, authored by Lloyd H. Mayer, Esq., which details (in English as plain as possible) the regulations.

Please use the list as a handout at meetings of directors, trustees, and anyone that you think would benefit from knowing the legal rules pertaining to public policy related philanthropy.

A private foundation may

• Make a grant to a charity
  • for general support (that is, an unrestricted grant), even if the charity uses the grant funds for lobbying or nonpartisan voter participation efforts;
  • for a specific advocacy project, if the charity provides a project budget showing that the non-lobbying project expenditures are at least as much as the grant;
  • for a specific voter participation project, not involving voter registration, as long as the project is nonpartisan; and
  • for a specific voter participation project involving voter registration as long as the project is nonpartisan, the voter registration takes place over more than one election cycle and in at least five states, and the charity meets certain financial support tests.

• Make a grant to a non-charity, including a foreign nongovernmental organization that has not been recognized as a charity by the IRS
• for a specific advocacy project if the foundation conducts a limited pre-grant inquiry, has a grant agreement with certain terms, receives reports on the use of the grant, and reports certain information to the IRS; and
• for a specific nonpartisan voter participation project, not involving voter registration, if the same conditions are met.

• Directly advocate for public policy as long as such advocacy is not lobbying or falls within the self-defense, technical assistance, jointly-funded project, or nonpartisan analysis, study, or research exceptions.

• Directly encourage voter participation, other than through voter registration, as long as such encouragement is nonpartisan.

A community foundation may

• Make a grant to a charity
• for general support (that is, an unrestricted grant), even if the charity uses the grant funds for lobbying or nonpartisan voter participation efforts;
• for a specific advocacy project, including if that project involves lobbying, as long as the community foundation does not exceed its permitted level of lobbying; and
• for a specific voter participation project, as long as the project is nonpartisan.

• Make a grant to a non-charity
• for a specific advocacy project, including if that project involves lobbying, as long as the community foundation does not exceed its permitted level of lobbying; and
• for a specific voter participation project, as long as the project is nonpartisan.

• Directly advocate for public policy, including by lobbying, subject to one of two following limits on lobbying:
• the default limit that the lobbying not be more than an insubstantial part of the community foundation's activities; or
• the optional sliding percentage scale limit on expenditures for lobbying (known as the expenditure test), starting at 20 percent of the first $500,000 in total charitable expenditures (5 percent for grassroots lobbying) and ultimately reaching a maximum of $1 million ($250,000 for grassroots lobbying) with $17 million or more in annual charitable expenditures.

• Directly encourage voter participation, as long as such participation is nonpartisan.

Additional Legal Resources

Advocacy Institute
www.advocacy.org
Many useful ideas and stories for effective advocacy and leadership growth.

Alliance for Justice
www.afj.org
Find out about the training and publications available to help your foundation understand the laws governing advocacy. Also see AFJ's Nonprofit and Foundation Advocacy Blog.

Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest
www.clpi.org
Provides easy to read, one-pagers on various aspects of public interest lobbying and voter education.

Council on Foundations
www.cof.org
Their public policy web page includes key resources for foundations including information about foundations that have been nationally recognized for their work in the public policy arena.

Domini Social Investments
www.domini.com/shareholder-advocacy/index.htm
A great place to learn about the world of shareholder advocacy.

Forum of Regional Association of Grantmakers
www.givingforum.org
Resources for grantmakers about getting involved and taking action on public policy. See their public policy toolkit.

Grantcraft
www.grantcraft.org
See Grantcraft's informative primer called Advocacy Funding: The Philanthropy of Changing Minds for information about the why and how of funding advocacy.

Nonprofit Good Practice Guide
www.npgoodpractice.org
A web-based center for learning about sound nonprofit and foundation practices sponsored.

Northern California Grantmakers Association's Public Policy Grantmaking Toolkit
www.ncg.org
The primary goal of this website is to demystify public policy grantmaking with an eye towards building the capacity of funders to engage in public policy initiatives. They also have a toolkit.

NPAction
www.NPAction.org
An all in one place to learn about public policy advocacy and to use web-based tools for advocacy directed at government and media.

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Connect Project
www.rwjf.org/publications/connect/about.jhtml?gsa=1
Brings together grantees and policymakers for educational purposes and to build working relationships.

Strengthening Nonprofit Advocacy Project
www.ombwatch.org/snap
National research findings on the factors that influence nonprofit public policy participation including legal, foundation, and monetary influence from OMB Watch, Tufts University, and Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest.

Urban Institute
www.urban.org/nonprofits
Shares research and discussion papers on the topic of advocacy prepared for the Urban Institute's Center for Nonprofits and Philanthropy's seminar on nonprofit advocacy. The papers investigate important questions about the basis for and nature of nonprofit advocacy in the U.S. political process.

W.K. Kellogg Foundation
www.wkkf.org
Their Policy Toolkit provides "worry-free" lobbying advice.

Click here to see all our links to other useful web sites.

To Learn More
From big picture concerns—like the risks and rewards of advocacy—to specifics such as legal rules, Power in Policy shows what advocacy means in terms of work and outcomes and how foundations can develop and launch their own public policy activities.

Besides the resources above, our trilogy of texts—Power in Policy; The Lobbying and Advocacy Handbook for Nonprofit Organizations and The Nonprofit Board Member's Guide to Lobbying and Advocacy—are designed to help grantmakers, nonprofit organizations, and nonprofit board members understand their crucial role in influencing public policy through the legal tools available to them. They are the culmination of our six-year effort, via publishing, to educate the nonprofit community on the value of policy-shaping activities.

Sincerely,

Vince Hyman
Publishing Director
Fieldstone Alliance

January 10, 2007

 

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