FUNDING YOUR COALITION
Please note, this section is not meant to discourage you from forming a coalition, it is only intended to help make you aware of potential expenses so you can do preplanning in advance to come up with creative solutions on how to fund your landowner coalition.
Funding Expenses
Expenses for the landowner coalition can be funded in a variety of ways such as:
o Individual contributions and donations by members. Please note that unless you are a 501(c) 3 non-profit organization, then donations to your group will not be federally deductible.
o Contributions by local business – many local businesses may be willing to donate to your organization, especially if you allow them to advertise on your website – this can be done using a simple link or banner advertisements. A good place to start to find a listing of local businesses is with your local Chamber of Commerce.
• Grant opportunities by private companies and foundations – there may be opportunities for grant opportunities locally (include link to grant opportunities). The one downside to applying for grants is the requirements can be very specific and writing a grant can be very time consuming, however, there are a number of books (link) and companies that can provide assistance.
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Accepting Donations Online
You can accept credit card donations online by including a Paypal button on your website. Paypal has become the standard for accepting online payments easily. To accept donation online, you first need to set up a paypal premier or business account. One big difference between these accounts is the business account allows you to display your business name and logo, while the Premier (personal) account displays the Paypal account owner and name.
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When signing up for a Paypal account, you'll want to sign up with Website Payments Standard. This will allow you to easily add Paypal buttons to your website and allow people to use their credit cards to pay online. People paying or donating to you online do not need a Paypal account to do this.
There is not a monthly fee with Paypal Website Payments Standard, you just pay a small transaction fee and transaction percentage - based on volume of transactions. The highest fees you'll pay (based on lowest transaction volume) is 2.9% of transaction amount + $0.30 per transaction.
Paypal provides very easy reporting mechanisms as well as the ability to issue refunds and send requests for money. You can learn more at the Paypal website.
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