National Association for Business Economics

Please revisit your bylaws and be sure they are current.
Some chapters reported they recently incorporated and in that process rewrote their bylaws. Bylaws can be changed to expand the definition of a member, define officer roles, explain officer liability, for example.
It is also important for a group of people to know the status of the organization, have access to the bank account, be able to know how the chapter operates. Bylaws can help define roles.
If officer roles need to change—i.e, a particular officer has a disproportionately large amount of work to do—the bylaws can be brought up to date with the current situation. This clarifies responsibilities and is an accurate template for new officers to follow.
We talked about personal liability that officers might face. At its most basic, officers could be responsible for charges they incur for the chapter (event planning) if the chapter does not have sufficient funds. Liability for injuries that might occur at an event site are not likely, but you may want to include a statement in your bylaws that explicitly states your officers are not liable. Having an attorney review your bylaws is a good idea.

Steps to become a 501c3

Some chapters have full tax-exempt status (501c3) and some meet a less stringent status (501c6). Some chapters have incorporated. If you’d like to see what steps NABE took to establish a 501c3 Education Foundation, you may e-mail Susan Doolittle, NABE’s Executive Director, at doolittle@nabe.com.
You may also search the IRS website for “Types of Tax Exempt Organizations” and “Publication 557” which outlines the necessary steps for 501c3 status.
While it takes some effort to incorporate, gaining 501c3 status can be really helpful when you are fundraising.
If you establish 501c3 status, it is still very important to keep good accounting records because the IRS will review you after five years and ask you to report certain financial information, such as how you spent your money, and good records will make it easier to accurately report to the IRS.

It is essential to have a good accounting/bookkeeping system. One chapter related how important a tax ID is because banks will not allow a chapter to add or subtract people on the account without it (making transitioning the office of treasurer difficult) and many companies cutting checks want the information.
It is important to spread the tasks of running a chapter among your officers. Several chapters reported their officers’ roles and what works well for them.
Regardless of the officer’s title, it is essential to have someone in charge of membership and corporate development. These positions require follow-through after meetings, greeting newcomers at your events, annual subscription drives.
The Richmond Chapter benefits greatly from the time and expertise of its past president who helps with meeting contacts, getting in touch with newspapers, being sure the chapter’s events are featured in the calendar section, helps update the website and serves as historian.
Because the Richmond chapter has more volunteers than board positions, they created an Advisory Panel to get these folks involved.

Know your audience, know your member
Know what will set your chapter’s events apart in your community
THEN find a speaker and a topic
Getting the right speakers and topics will help you attract and retain members.
NABE’s president and other board members may be available to speak at your chapters
See Business Economics for speaker and topic ideas
Consider both single-speaker presentations as well as panel discussions

Please see the chapter pages at www.nabe.com. You’ll find the toolkit—a how-to booklet for organizing and running your chapters. Download it and personalize it for your officers. It is helpful to keep all contact info in one spot and have a reference for checklists to do prior to events, checklists for the day off the event, examples of invitations, thank you’s, announcements, etc.
Please send us the contact information for your new chapter officers. We’ll update our database and be sure you know about upcoming teleconferences and other information we want to share with our chapter leadership.

Special thanks to Roger Bird of Philadelphia for taking charge of this project and writing the survey questions. Thanks to Bruce Kratofil for writing a summary and posting the results on the web.
This survey shares common practices of chapters across the country. One president is presenting the survey to her board to support her case for making some changes to their organization.

Thanks to all who participated and shared in our discussion!

Laurie King, NABE board member and Senior Writer at Capital Guardian
213-486-9960
lajk@capgroup.com

Ssusan Forte O’Neill, Forte Designs 949-443-4026 info@fortedesigns.net

Rosemary Marcuss, incoming NABE president and Deputy Director of the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Rosemary.Marcuss@bea.doc.gov

Susan Doolittle, NABE Executive Director, 202-463-6223 doolittle@nabe.com

Bruce Kratofil, NABE Webmaster, 216-228-7006 brucek@bjkresearch.com

Chapter leaders

Mark Ford, Dallas Economists Club, mford2@txugas.com

David Teolis, Detroit Assoc for Business Economics, david.teolis@gm.com

Mark LeClair, Economic Assoc of Southern Connecticut , mleclair@fair1.fairfield.edu

Don Klepper-Smith, Hartford Area Business Economists, donks@aol.com

Josh Lichtman, Los Angeles Chapter, jlichtman@fulbright.com

John Pope, Institute for Financial Economics—Minneapolis, pope@investmenteconomics.com

Roger Bird, Philadelphia Council for Business Economics, RogerB@AmerColl.edu

Jackie Hudson, Richmond Assoc of Business Economists, jahudson@vec.state.va.us

Judy Blinder, Seattle Economists Club, sec@pnrec.org

Knud Jacobson, Silicon Valley Chapter, kj@rationalperspectives.com

Robert Lewis, St. Louis Gateway Chapter NABE, blewis@development-strategies.com

Ken Matheny, St. Louis Gateway Chapter NABE, matheny@macroadvisers.com