[hpsdr] An SDR Non-profit educational endeavor.

[Jeremy McDermond]

On Apr 22, 2013, at 6:21 AM, K4LCD <k4lcd at bellsouth.net> wrote:

> ***** High Performance Software Defined Radio Discussion List *****
> 
> Great idea Tim to get the Boy Scouts and the Cub Scouts interested via presentations from Hams.
> 
> What I am suggesting is to institutionalize this project on a non-profit i.e IRS Chapter 501(c)(3) tax exempt organizations so that it can receive funding from corporations, individuals and foundations to prepare educational materials, such as videos, power points, handouts, etc.  in order to assist hams, radio clubs and educators during their presentations.

Running a 501(c)(3) is a fairly large and expensive undertaking.  You pretty much have to have a state non-profit corporation to start out with.  In Oregon, that's worth $100/yr alone.  Plus, you will have to comply with all the formalities of the corporate form such as having a board of directors, officers, bylaws, etc.

Additionally, the current fee for the IRS to merely apply to be a 501(c)(3) is a minimum of $400.  Also note that Form 1023 to get your tax-exempt certification is 26 pages long.  This doesn't include any fees you're going to have to be yearly to an accountant to get your From 990 filed (even though you're tax exempt, you still have to file an informational return).

In summary, being a 501(c)(3) is not easy and it's not necessarily cheap.

Understanding that I'm necessarily biased because I'm a part of the organization, may I humbly suggest that this is the sort of mission that TAPR was founded to provide.  We already have the 501(c)(3) organization set up and ready to go, and are a long-lived and fairly stable charity.  We welcome donations from anyone who would like to provide them.

On the expenditures side of things, these are the sorts of things that we'd be proud to be associated with.  We do have a history of supporting publications, but we honestly haven't done very many in a while besides the PSR newsletter.  The primary reason for this is that TAPR is fundamentally a volunteer organization. While it may sometimes seem that we're an 800 lb. gorilla like the ARRL, TAPR has an all-volunteer board of directors and executive.  None of us receive any compensation for our time or efforts (although we do receive reimbursement for certain expenses).  There are also only nine of us involved with TAPR governance.  We're not the ARRL with a shiny building in Newington with paid staff.

What I'm trying to say is that we would welcome more volunteers to come up with these sorts of materials.  We're happy to then facilitate getting them published and distributed.  We honestly view it as part of our mission.  We just haven't had anyone step up to fill the role of some of the past volunteers that have directed those publications.

In this vein, I'd like to make the general announcement that TAPR's mission is all about the research, development and education pertaining to digital amateur radio.  Anything that falls within this umbrella is something that we're interested in figuring out how we can help.  If you have projects that you would like to see happen that need funding or support, we're really want to talk to you about seeing how TAPR may be able to help you get them done.  We recently made a $500 grant to a middle school here in Oregon so that they could build simple morse code oscillators to learn about electronics theory and practice.  Please feel free to contact me with ideas.  We don't only manufacture openHPSDR boards.

> Thank you for replying!
> 
> Regards and 73
> 
> Juan /K4LCD

--
Jeremy McDermond (NH6Z)
Vice President
TAPR


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