The Stigma Against Fiscal Sponsorship Needs To End

Hi everyone. Sunday was Father’s Day, so I spent all day with my two kids, 4-year-old Viet and 1-year-old Kiet, to remind me of the reason I do this work every day. And that reason is—I have to earn money to pay for the exorbitant childcare. Just kidding. (Kind of). I pulled them around the neighborhood on a little red wagon. We picked strawberries and raspberries and played hide-and-seek and read books about bunnies and little blue trucks. It was an amazing day, and it made me grateful for the wonderful community we’re building together as a sector.

All of that to say, I didn’t write a blog post today. However, I wrote a post earlier this week, published on my organization’s blog, which publishes weekly on Wednesday and has had several thought-provoking posts on a variety of topics, written the team. As we do the work, we want to share lessons learned from the challenges and successes in working to develop the power of communities of color and the organizations led by them. If you like the stuff on NAF, you’ll likely enjoy the content on the RVC blog.

Except from the post:

“One of the common complaints lobbed against the nonprofit sector is that we have too many nonprofits competing for resources. So when someone suggests that they might possibly be thinking of maybe starting their own nonprofit, the response from many of us is often ‘Get the torches and pitchforks!’ Then we chase after them, flinging rocks and hummus, until they and their ridiculous ideas of founding a nonprofit are driven out of our village.

“The more reasonable and understanding of us, though, may suggest that they do some due diligence, possibly looking to be fiscally sponsored by another nonprofit instead of forming their own.

“This makes a lot of sense. However, the concept of fiscal sponsorship is somehow unpalatable in many parts of our sector. It’s as if you’re not a ‘real’ nonprofit unless you have 501c status. My organization until recently was fiscally sponsored, so we know how it feels. You feel like a kid trying to get a seat at the adult table. Like Pinocchio, you’re not a ‘real boy’ if you’re fiscally sponsored!” [Read further]

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