One Volunteer
October 18, 2007
9:39 AM CST
As some of you may recall, in 2005 we incorporated the “Nation of Volunteers Foundation, Inc.” (NoV) in Texas. That not-for-profit organization became the parent for The Nation of Riflemen (NoR) as well as other “projects.” That organization has allowed us to keep separate our personal business from our public activities. We “gave” all the various public projects to the NoV:
Nation of Riflemen
Literate Nation
National Ammo Day
We later added Jefferson Ideal although that baby is still in diapers.
Yes, we’ve spread ourselves too thin and the continual demands on our time have left a bit of a mess (that we attack in bits and pieces as we have time… and is one of the main reason my blog has been and will continue to be ignored for a long while).
Since that time, however, we have been hindered from doing more by the paperwork necessary to raise general funds (in states other than Texas) and to obtain “tax deductible” status.
The greater hindrance, however, is the amount of time we spend in our day jobs. (Not complaining, just sharing the facts.) I was able to do a lot of this stuff while I was consulting, but with the full time gig it has proved to be impossible.
Kim and I are doing OK. I continue to work the day job and the biography commissions Kim is getting through MyBiographer enable us to get some of the bills paid. That combined with the occasional personal BLEG and we keep the electricity turned on.
Kim and I are happy. The kids are happy, too. We realize that we have something special and our financial predicament, although often exhausting and taxing, doesn’t cause us to lose sight of that. That doesn’t mean that we don’t want to do something else.
That something else was The Shooting Trail. We loved doing that. In fact, we loved it so much that we continued doing it until we both collapsed from exhaustion, combined with the India project of last year that forced us to put it on hold. We loved it so much that when we dream of winning the lottery, we STILL think of doing that. Right at the time we had to stop doing it we were offered our first formal advertising for it. We had to turn it down, knowing we were not going to be able to deliver. We’ve heard from quite a number of people that they loved it, too. That on hold is now coming up on its one year anniversary.
When we were visiting Combat Controller last weekend we talked about this and how much we’d love to be able to get back to it. We talked about the various ways we could make that happen.
What became clear in talking it through is that Kim and I aren’t interested in getting rich. Being rich would be nice, but that isn’t what floats our boat. What we’d like to be able to do is devote ourselves to all the various NoV projects on a full time basis. The Shooting Trail, slightly modified in format, blends perfectly with the goals of the NoR as well as with the other projects under the NoV umbrella. Traveling the country (and the world, when possible) visiting shooters, getting more people into shooting, promoting the shooting sports, the love of country and independence shooting provides… and doing all of that to counter the negative portrayals and stereotypes of the evils of guns. It seems like a win-win to us.
We’d like to do all of the above full time. Kim loves doing the biographies and wouldn’t give that up, but the small fee he charges for doing that would never cover our monthly nut (but continuing to do it part time would help to pay off our nose bleed debt). My Biographer is more along the lines of a part time gig and a passion more than anything else.
It became clear that what we really need is an Angel. We need someone to pay our salaries and expenses to do all of the above. We would need about $250K in the first year and then about $175K a year to cover the expenses (and our salaries) of all of the above projects. We could beg for the money from various foundations and granting agencies yearly or we could find a BIG angel who would endow the NoV for about $3 million ONCE. The annual interest on that endowment would make it possible for us to do all of that, and more, and still provide some hedge against inflation.
But we can’t look for an angel until we complete the paperwork and all the necessary filings. We can’t pay to have someone do it because we don’t have the money to do that either.
We need a volunteer (not money) to help us file the paperwork to get the NoV registered in the states that require it, and then to assist us with getting the tax-deductible designation. Once that is done we can set about to raise the money to fund all of the above.
And what are we giving to the deal?
We have “given” The Shooting Trail to the Nation of Volunteers Foundation, Inc. It will no longer be a “for profit” entity. That and the promise to commit to all of the above until Kim and I can no longer work (about 25+ years), spending six months of the year filming and editing promoting the patriotism and fun of the art and sport of shooting through The Shooting Trail (and broadcasting it on the web), and using the rest of our time to spread the lessons of the Western Canon (Literate Nation), the advantages of entrepreneurship (Jefferson Ideal), the spirit of action (Ammo Day), and turning America back into a Nation of Rifleman (NoR), one person at a time.
One person at a time, one day at a time, one year at a time, until we drop dead.
We need help. We need a lawyer or an adviser who can help us through the bureaucracy. Once that’s done, we’ll need help with getting funds… but let’s not put that horse before the cart.
One volunteer. One.
