Re: Q for Peter

Eva asked:
>> 1. Do you understand the Guild's charter, bylaws and legal/tax
>> classification?

At 02:09 p.m. 01/17/98 +0000, Peter Knaggs wrote:
>I don't quite understand Kynn's comment that the Guild is an educational
>one, as a Guild is a Guild, that is to say BOTH educational AND
>professional.

I think the answer, then, is "no" -- to Eva's question.

There are at least two different categories, for legal and
tax purposes, that the Guild can fall under.  An "educational
organization" and a "professional organization".  The Guild
leaders chose to make us an "educational organization", not
a "professional" one.

This has very real implications for how the Board runs the
Guild, and for how members of the Board must make our decisions.

For example, the Guild -- when requesting our 501(c)3 status --
was asked to justify how we were spending money on the Request
for Proposals and Job Services programs, as those fall under
more of "professional services" rather than "educational
services".  We had to provide estimates of how much of our
time was spent on those activities, with the numbers kept down
low, as the Guild must support the objectives in our charter
first, with "professional"-style services taking a back seat
at best.

These are very important things for all potential Board members
to realize here -- you cannot simply make promises that you'll
change the Board, when we are legally prevented from making
your changes.

Or rather, as a candidate, you _can_ say whatever you like;
however, the membership should be aware of what simply is not
possible, and I urge them to vote for those candidates who
present reasonable, doable platforms, rather than those who
make vague or impossible promises while trying to get
elected.

--
Kynn Bartlett <kynn(at)hwg.org>
President, HTML Writers Guild
http://www.hwg.org/

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