Parents Owner/coaches involvement in parents association

[Mommy25qtpies]

can someone direct me to the rules about coaches/owners involvement in the PA. Specifically the rules on them dictating how the PA is run.

Thank you in advance.

 

[nycgymmom]

As I have been researching because I want to start one, they can give their opinion but can't dictate what the PA does with its money. Here is a great article
https://usagym.org/pages/memclub/biztips/articles/2015_0417.html

 

[skschlag]

Well and it depends on whether or not your PA is a 501c3 or not.

 

[Mommy25qtpies]

It is a 501c3

 

[skschlag]

OK. Then owners/coaches can be a part of the club, but cannot sit on the board or make the decisions for the club.

We just went through a year of reorg to be 501c3/IRS compliant and NCAA compliant. If you have any questions, I can try to answer them for you as best I can

 

[Mommy25qtpies]

The big question is can they dictate what fundraisers we do and that participation is mandatory to stay at the gym.

 

[Randomactsofcheer]

The big question is can they dictate what fundraisers we do and that participation is mandatory to stay at the gym.

Maybe to the first question and absolutely not the the second. For fundraisers, it depends on how your PA decides what fundraisers to do. If you have a special events board member who decides on the fundraisers, then the owner cannot decide which fundraisers to do. If the fundraisers are decided on by a board vote, then the owner cannot decide which fundraisers to do.

And mandating participation in the PA and/or PA fundraisers in order to stay at the gym is prohibited by the IRS for a 501c3.

 

[gymdoc]

I am in charge of our parent group and we function as a 501c3. Our owner does not come to parent meetings or sit on the committee, but I send her a copy of all our meeting minutes.

We do run all our fundraisers by her, since we are either using her facility (like for a parent run open gym), or we are promoting the gym name in the community (Spirit Nights, local baseball game, selling stuff to neighbors and family, etc). There has been only one idea that she wasn't comfortable with, so we just came up with something else. It didn't feel like she was "dictating" what fundraisers we do. Felt more collaborative

We don't have mandatory participation, and no, not every one participates in the fundraisers but we all get equal benefit. Sucks a little to be honest

 

[skschlag]

The big question is can they dictate what fundraisers we do and that participation is mandatory to stay at the gym.

So, what everyone says is true. In a 501c3 you cannot mandate participation, and everyone gets equal benefits. Not sure how joining your PA works. Ours is voluntary to join. We cannot force people to participate in our fundraiser. but we can remove people from the PA for "obstruction of business." We have never had to do this, as all in our PA join voluntarily and want to be there. We also currently have 5 different gyms that have members in our PA so we don't have any input from any coaches

 

[suebee]

The booster club at dd's gym is a 501(c)3. Joining the booster club is not required for team families. However only the gymnasts whose families are in booster club get any money from the booster club. By joining the booster club, a family agrees to fundraise at least a minimum amount. The money is split equally among all the booster club gymnasts, regardless of whether you fundraised the minimum amount or 100x the minimum amount.

Am I correct in understanding that this is not allowed under 501(c)3 rules? What are the potential consequences for a parent who joins a booster club like this?

 

[skschlag]

Ours is set up like this and has been reviewed by non profit lawyers. Our board is made up of people who do bout have gymnasts and receive no benefits. We do things for all gymnasts from time to time.

 

[Gymmommy71]

So many 501c3 booster clubs do things that aren't allowed. These clubs get away with this stuff for years and keep doing it - for instance, all the 501c3's around me require people to be members to be on team - most require people to work fundraisers against their will and some fine members hundreds of dollars for not working. My bet is the that regulators who are supposed to make sure this stuff is on the up and up don't care enough to audit/verify things. Maybe they are depending on people to report violations but no one wants too cause they don't want retaliation from their gym. Or maybe they don't have much incentive to bust illegal booster clubs because they think their illegal actions are based more on being unknowledgeable of the laws versus being deceitful - or they know they have very little chance of collecting any fines assessed because of the distributed nature of the membership. For instance, say the IRS fines booster club A $10,000 - if the club doesn't have the funds in an account to pay it, or doesn't pay it, what are they gonna do - go after every member for a portion? Where would they even get the membership list of persons to target?