Here is the treasurer's report on Cyberspace Communications, Inc. finances 
through December 31st, 2007.

Beginning Balance     $6,735.70

Credits                 $432.00         Member contributions
                          $0.98         Interest on our savings account
                   ------------
                        $432.98

Debits                  $100.00         Provide Net colocation (thru 1/22/08)
                         $51.29         Phone Bill
                          $5.89         Paypal fees (income = $162)
                         $15.45         Renewal of cyberspace.org thru 1/12/09
                         $15.45         Renewal of grex.org thru 2/27/09
                   ------------
                        $188.08

Ending Balance        $6,980.60

Our current balance breaks down as follows:

$6,803.23               General Fund
  $177.37               Silly Hat Fund

The money is distributed like this:

$5,052.09   Checking account
$1,928.51   Savings account earning 0.63% interest annually

We had three returning members in December (steve, glenda, and tod).  We 
are currently at 53 members, 43 of whom are paid through at least 
January 15th.  (The others expired recently and are in a grace period.)

If you or your institution would like to become a member of Grex, it 
only costs $6/month or $60/year.  Send money to:

Cyberspace Communications
P. O. Box 4432
Ann Arbor, MI 48106-4432

If you pay by cash or money order, please include a photocopy of some form 
of ID.  We can't add you to the rolls without ID.  (If you pay with a 
personal check that has your name pre-printed on it, we consider that a 
good enough ID.)  Type !support or see 
  http://www.cyberspace.org/member.html
for more info, including instructions for sending money to Grex with a 
credit card, via Paypal.

22 responses total.

Since grex has plenty of savings, would it make sense to have an 
occasional honorary membership for staff and/or board members who cannot 
afford the $60/year?  If not, does anyone besides me want to contribute to 
unicorn's dues?  I only paid for 3 months (so he could run for the board) 
and he has to continue as a member to stay on the board, and is currently 
not very employed due to a recession in Flint.

Grex has an ongoing tradition of people paying for "scholarships" for
other people, either anonymously or with the donor identified.  

I would strongly discourage using membership dues to selectively give
privileges to board members or staff.  It's probably illegal, but in any
case, I think it would be unethical.  

This is not a case of privileges, but of a valuable staff and board member
needing to be a paying member to continue on the board.  As a staff member,
he could probably find some way to telnet out of grex.

Yes, he is a valuable staff member. However, it just simply would be
inappropriate for the board to pay for a membership. It is perfectly ok
for other members to pay for it. I hope that people decide to do that. 

Okay, slynne, do you want to contribute to his last nine months?  If I paid
$18 for three months, would it be $60-18 for the next nine, or how much?

$60 would be for an entire year. I am considering such a donation. I
havent decided yet. 

You could give him a membership for free, you know.  See my proposal from a
while back to automatically grant all staffers memberships.

Or he could buck up and get a job.  Recession in flint or no, there has to
be someone hiring people to do something.

I'd support giving active staff members membership status.  Grex is flush 
with cash and short on staff.  I suspect those on staff who could afford 
donating to Grex would still do so.  And as far as deciding who was 
"active" enough to qualify, well, I'd leave that to the staff member to 
decide for him or herself.  

I'm not sure if such a thing would require voting to amend the bylaws.

Would the value of membership need to be stated in the bylaws in order
to avoid having it considered income for purposes of taxes and
reporting? What would be the ramifications of this? Employment
insurance? Workmans comp?

Value of Grex membership?  Surely you jest.

The sum total of a membership donation to Grex is considered deductible as 
a charitable donation, it's that trivial.  So I'd not worry about it.  
Unless you want to, of course.

Maybe the thing to do would be to say that the requirements for
membership are $6/month OR being an active staff member. 

All I'm saying is I don't want a staffer to get audited and be asked if
they received any compensation, money or otherwise, for any other work,
and them have to wonder if said membership constituted "compensation".

S.Lynne's suggestion might be a way around that.

I dont think my suggestion would be a way around that issue at all. But,
seriously, we are talking about $60/year here so I dont think it would
matter much. On the other hand, we could probably look around at what
other non-profits do with their volunteers. I imagine that many of them
give some kind of perks to their volunteers. 

How about the requirements for board member being active membership or being
a staff member?  Surely being a board member cannot be construed as
compensation for being a staff member.

That might be a good compromise 

That would require a change to the bylaws.  And it introduces the question
of what to do when a board member is on the staff but not very active.

How come you need to pay to be on the board but not on the staff?

The question is more accurately phrased "Why do you have to be a member
to be on the board, but not on the staff"?

And the answer is "Because the founding Grexers voted to do it that way
when they set up the corporation".  

So do we change the laws, or would someone else like to help fund membership
for a destitute staff and board member?

How about changing the laws so that in order to serve on the board you need
to be contributing to grex either by paying membership dues, or by serving
as staff, both of which also require some sort of validation?  Then someone
could still be on the staff and board without being a member, and nobody could
be accused of not reporting a grex membership as income.

see Response 17.  

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