[permaculture] Transition Town Initiative US

Thomas Allen thallen at nwlink.com
Fri Feb 20 00:55:05 EST 2009


To clarify the tax issue:
TI US has told us, if I understand them correctly, that we can be a  
chapter and operate under their 501c3 tax status by virtue of their  
arrangement with Post Carbon Institute. Our regional umbrella group  
has told us we can be a chapter and operate under their non-profit  
status, too... When they get it. Application has been made.

I'm not yet sure what it means to be an "official" TI US site.  We  
would like the convenience of operating under someone's non-profit  
status other than our own. We would also like to adopt some of the  
methods of TI US.  I have read the manual and I think they have a lot  
to offer. But the regional umbrella group does too and they are a lot  
closer to home. We'd really rather not be forced to chose. But for  
the tax status issue I don't think we would have to choose. We'd just  
adopt whatever part of TI US methods suit us and go on our merry way.  
BTW we have the great fortune to have 4 PDC grads on the board.

On Feb 19, 2009, at 12:27 PM, Todd Siegel wrote:

> I'm curious, what's this issue with being a non-profit?  The
> initiative that I'm a part of is putting an application together and
> it's my understanding that legal status doesn't matter.  Your group
> can be an informal group of neighbors, formal non-profit, whatever.
> Unless something's changed that I don't know about.
>
> As for PCI dropping support for the Relocalization groups, that was
> just an official announcement of what has been understood for a while
> now.  PCI wasn't providing much support for the groups other than
> hosting a website.  In the announcement that I saw, PCI is
> "encouraging" Relocalization groups to join Transition, not to
> compete.  I am no expert on PCI's Relocalization movement, but it
> seemed very loosely structured, whereas Rob Hopkins and the Transition
> Network in the UK have created a model and support system for
> neighborhoods to use.
>
> Todd
>
> On Feb 19, 2009, at 12:20 PM, Thomas Allen wrote:
>
>> Transition Town Initiative US is apparently growing quickly in the
>> US. No news there. My newly-formed neighborhood group in Seattle has
>> made application to join with them as an official site. This action
>> is complicated by the issue of non-profit status as we are also a
>> part of the Puget Sound region umbrella group, SCALLOPS. They and TI
>> US are, or soon will be, US tax exempt organizations. So it seems we
>> must be either fish or fowl.
>>
>> This issue is of interest to several groups in the area. As I have
>> researched the TI US group and its adoption by Post Carbon Institute
>> I have created more questions than I have had answered. In
>> particular, the sudden demise of PCI's Relocalization outposts has
>> raised more than one eyebrow. So far, no one I have talked to in the
>> region's existing sustainability groups has any idea of what the
>> relationship between PCI and TI US means for their group, if
>> anything. But there is a consensus that there's no time to reinvent
>> the wheel nor form competing camps. There are groups in our area that
>> have been active for nearly forty years and would like to amplify
>> their efforts but not at the expense of entanglements they don't
>> understand.
>>
>> Post Carbon Institute is rather new on the scene and we really don't
>> know much about it or Julian Darley, its founder. Any comments that
>> could enlighten us are appreciated.
>>
>> --Tom Allen
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