Nonprofit Capacity Building

Congress enacted, as part of the Serve America Act, an amendment by Senators Max Baucus (D-MT) and Charles Grassley (R-IA) to set up a Nonprofit Capacity Building program to expand organizational development assistance to small and midsize nonprofit organizations. See the text of the Baucus-Grassley amendment (PDF).

Grants
The Corporation for National and Community Service would make 3-year grants of not less than $200,000 to intermediary nonprofit organizations to pay the Federal share of the cost of organizational development assistance to small and midsize nonprofit organizations.

• Each state – to the extent practicable the Corporation must make a grant to an intermediary in each state.
• Hardship – preference will be given to areas where nonprofits face resource hardships.
• Considerations – the Corporation will take into consideration the number of and degree to which organizations will be assisted by a grant, and the quality of the assistance.

Organizational Development Assistance
The types of assistance funded under grants could include:

• Training on best practices,
• Financial planning,
• Grantwriting, and
• Compliance with the applicable tax laws.

50% Matching Grants
Each intermediary grantee must match the federal funds with a non-federal share which may be provided through charitable grantmaking entities, corporate philanthropy, individual donors, state and local government, or other sources.

• Intermediaries that are foundations, donor advised funds, and supporting organizations (except Type III functionally integrated supporting organizations) must provide the non-federal share from within that grantee’s own funds.
• Provision of the non-federal share must not decrease levels of funding from the same sources in the preceding year.

Authorization of funds
Authorizes $5 million each year from 2010 through 2014.

Key definitions:
Intermediary nonprofit organization – an experienced and capable nonprofit entity with meaningful prior experience in providing organizational development assistance, or capacity building assistance, focused on small and midsize nonprofit organizations.

Nonprofit – a 501(c)(3) organization.

Last Updated: July 27, 2009

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