the m p w c Foundation, inc.  

For our grants to you and other organizations to continue each year, we must have reliable financial statements (and since we believe you need them for your own uses, they might well be the same ones you give to your board). They must include a statement of all receipts and all expenditures as well as a year end statement of assets (or cash). They must be reconciled to one another.  They must have useful comparative information (such as last year, this year, original budget for this year, next year budget, as well as explanations for variations between years and from original projections). And, most importantly, they must meet normal rules for financial statement reporting, chiefly consistency and/or disclosures rules.   See the most acceptable example of this at financial-examples.   We are very interested in observing that your financial statements themselves clearly disclose the following information: 

1. We are, and your board should be, interested in what amount and percentage of total expeditures is actually spent on behalf of your beneficiaries (for your mission) and what amount and percentage is spent on overhead and how this trend is changing from year to year?  Is this ascertainable easily on your financial statements?
2. We are interested in any "net" fund-raising results.  Do you show the results of fund-raising AND its associated costs separately and then as a net?  Is this ascertainable easily on your financial statements?
3. Please disclose (even if "zero") salaries, fees, reimbursed expenses or any other rewards or benefits paid to insiders (defined as board members, officers, volunteers, or other non-Mexicans).
4. The above questions should be answered SOLELY by the presentation of such detailed information (including sub-totals) on your financial statements  themselves

And we are interested in being told the answers to the following second group of questions:

1. We want to know whether or not your financial statements are sent to any and all parties requesting them (whether or not they are part of your constituents)?    And are they the same ones that this Foundation receives and are your board members receiving at least as much information as that which this Foundation receives?
2. Are your officers and principal executives lifelong inhabitants of their positions or do you turnover such positions so that new ideas can take hold?
3. Are your meetings open to some sort of public scrutiny (or attendance)?
4. Tell us about  your web-site or lack thereof.   If you do have a web-site, what are the subjects covered?  Do you have a copy of your financial statements (for form 990ez, or both) on the web-site? 

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Regarding EMAILs and REPLYs to emails 

So that everyone saves time and understands what someone is referring to in an email, we suggest that you, as do we, USE "REPLY" AS A COMMON EMAIL TOOL.  As a result, ONE LONG EMAIL FOR ANY ONE YEAR should look something like the following:  

>>>     Some email writer asks a question or makes a comment

>>    The responder to the above email states their response on the next line

>  a later question of, or comment on, the above appears on the next line

A still later question or comment appears on the still next line

Please note that various email software handles REPLY in different ways.  The > and >> and >>> etc. is not used by all software and could possibly be replaced by  |  and  ||  and  |||  etc (as they are in the example way down below).  In other cases, certain software may not handle replies in this way so the responder/replyer/writer must "out-dent" (see the following definition) her/himself by copying and pasting the previous writer's email that is being responded to and making it LOOK like the "out-dents" illustrated above (to aid your understanding, look at the above example again, and see the "out-denting of each successive response (3 plus the original).

Definition of "out-dent".   The opposite of "indent", the process where each succeeding response by a writer responding to the previous writer, writes a response on a NEW and SEPARATE LINE (following a new BLANK LINE)  from the previous writer AND "out-dents" the writing so that it stands out as an easily noticeable response and not as part of the previous writing.  For those of you who do not know how to make a "new line", all you have to do is place your cursor at the EXACT END of the line (or even inside a line) you are going to comment upon, hit "enter", and then find yourself at a NEW LINE with a BLANK LINE separating the original and the response.  Only AFTER THAT should you start to type your response.

Remember:  DO NOT ADD your comment to the end of a line as that obscures the response and in the case of continuing responses also obscures WHO said WHAT to WHOM (i.e., it should always be clear WHO (of the two of you) is writing each comment).  Instead, ALWAYS ADD your response DIRECTLY UNDERNEATH in a SEPARATED (by a blank line) PARAGRAPH,

If necessary, especially in a long "back and forth" communication, it might be necessary to add "(organization) (date) said" (as in "J-A on 3/2/09 said") whenever that is needed for clarity (remember that these emails MAY be read by others and read much later -- even a year later -- and still understood). 

Please remember that it is important to submit ONE COMPLETE email for each grant year.  A series of emails is next to impossible for either party to track and keep under control.  Also remember that the Subject line on the email should be completely descriptive of its contents.

However, everyone MUST attempt to READ, UNDERSTAND, and COMPLETELY respond to whatever the other party asks or says or the process goes on almost forever and frustrates everyone.  EVERYTHING POSSIBLE must be directed to STOP THIS WASTED EFFORT.

Just to illustrate the above, I inserted below a picture (edited to disguise original private thoughts) that illustrates a 9/3/2008 response to an email that had at least 3 prior sendings back and forth.  The current sending is in blue, the previous in purple, the still prior in green or teal, and the earliest (or original) in red).  This color-coding was used ONLY to help in the below illustration.  A well-done REPLY that uses "out-denting" does not need the color-coding.  Note also the vertical lines (| and ||  and ||| at the left of each of the first/original (|||), the second (||), the third (|) responses, while the most recent response has no such vertical lines

“Underpromise and Overdeliver”

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