Foundation Law for Non-Lawyers

When my colleague and fellow attorney Lara Kalwinski, Senior Counsel for Policy and Compliance and Executive Director of National Standards, and I both came to the Council on Foundations in 2013, we each had extensive experience with the Council’s books, newsletters, and other legal publications. In fact, we both relied heavily on these resources in our previous positions.

Realizing that it was time to begin updating them to incorporate changes in the law and other new information, Lara and I began to brainstorm about the best ways to deliver the information to our members.

One of the biggest drawbacks we identified was the difficulty (and expense) of reprinting a book every few years to accommodate legal changes. We also felt searchability and an electronic format would be helpful, as well as more sample documents.

We envisioned a comprehensive, well-organized desk resource containing all the legal topics and guidance the Council had developed, researched, and authored over the years. Thus was born Mastering Foundation Law, The Council on Foundations Compendium of Legal Resources .

Designed as a binder series, the Compendium features chapters that can easily be updated and replaced. Each chapter will focus on a different area of law relevant to private and public charitable foundations, and include detailed citations and explanations of the applicable Internal Revenue Code and Treasury Regulation sections, relevant sample documents, and a discussion of state law issues that may apply.

Subscribers to the Compendium will have the choice to store chapters in printed or electronic format, and they will automatically receive updates as they become available.

Chapter 1, "Creating a Charitable Foundation: Formation and Considerations" and Chapter 7, "A Guide to Advocacy, Lobbying and Election Related Activity" have been completed and delivered to our initial subscribers, as has Chapter 27, entitled “ Expenditure Responsibility Step By Step”. Currently in the works and expected later this summer is:

• Chapter 4, “Overview of the Law Governing Community Foundations.”
• Chapter 28, “Economic Development as a Charitable Activity.”

We plan to end the year with:

• Chapter 13, “Unrelated Business Activity and UBIT.”
• Chapter 18, “Supporting Organizations, LLCs and Other Related Entities.”

While it may be obvious that the chapters are not being produced in numerical order, we are trying to be responsive to our members’ requests for information on the most popular and trending topics.

Lara and I will author much of the Compendium, but we are also including contributions from other legal experts in the field, such as Chapter 7 written by Perkins Coie attorney Katherine LaBeau. If you are an experienced foundation law practitioner interested in helping to prioritize future Compendium chapters or even authoring one, please email legal@cof.org to join our team of volunteer Field Editors.

We hope that many of you will join us on this multi-year journey as we fill the Compendium with all the legal information you need and expect from the Council.

The Compendium is exclusively available to Council members in 2016. To purchase a subscription or put your name down to be contacted when it is available to nonmembers, visit www.cof.org/compendium.