National NFC and Chapter Funding

National NFC funds all administrative costs associated with running the organization. This includes the website (domain registration/renewal, hosting, and maintenance including the state pages), newsletters (general, join, renew, donate), email address (info@nativefishcoalition.org), a single Zoom license, insurance, financial reporting, legal fees, merchandise, show registration, etc. Nothing is charged back to the chapters.

As a rule, new memberships, membership renewals, donations, merchandise sales, and grants attained by national NFC go to national NFC. This money is used to support general operations as well as chapter equipment, lab fees, signage, etc., where local funding is not available.

Chapter funding is a limiting factor in regard to growth right now.  And while we do not want to put the burden on chapters, we are looking for them to help out where they can.  Many chapters have already done so by obtaining local and state grants, coordinating fund-raisers and business sponsorships, and selling merchandise and promoting memberships and donations at shows and events.

As NFC continues to grow, while there will be no hard and fast rules, we are going to need to raise more money at the chapter level. But we will not leave chapters hanging in regard to funding for approved projects.  What we are looking to do is have chapters raise what they can when they can and where they can to help take pressure off of limited national funds.

Where requested/required, state and local grants, and local fund-raisers will be escrowed for use only in the respective state. The new STATE+ membership was created to allow people to direct some portion of their membership to their respective state as well.  This will help seed chapter escrow accounts that while spent locally, will be administered at the national level. We can make provisions for locally solicited donations as well.

Chapter raised funds can be for field equipment, lab fees, matching fund grants, etc., associated with the respective chapter. But like any other funding, projects and expenses will need to be approved by national NFC to make sure we are staying within our mission. In no case will locally raised money be used in any other state or for general national administration.