Starting your own charity or non-profit org

[EnlightenedEve]

I searched the site for this and nothing came up. If I am mistaken, please point me in the direction of any relevant information.

A friend of mine is trying to start her own non-profit organization. Since I have been working on starting one of my own, we have decided to help each other out. I have found out how to make sure that no other organizations have the same name, logo, or purpose, but that is as far as I can get. Does anyone know anything about actually starting a non-profit organization?

Feel free to post here or message me. Any advice or relevant information would be greatly appreciated.

[Senusret I]

First, get the book Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. I own that, as well as The Nonprofit Handbook by Grobman.

Visit http://foundationcenter.org/washington/ -- their library is FREE to visit and it's located conveniently near Farragut North metro. Also, sometimes they have FREE extra copies of the Chronicle of Philanthropy at the end of the month.

You mentioned Howard in another post, but I'm not sure if you're an undergrad or alum. They have an organization called American Humanics which trains students for non-profit careers.

Are you on facebook? I started a group called "Black Nonprofit Professionals" -- here is the link: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=12741235342

In my opinion, the hardest part about starting a non-profit is the board development and the fundraising. I have a lot of books on fundraising -- whenever you're ready, I can tell you the titles. Board development is hard. Since you're (presumably) young, you'll probably have a lot of friends in mind who are passionate about your mission. But do they have the $$$ to be fiducially (sp?) responsible for the org? That's a big deal for me.

I, too, will be starting a non-profit in the far future. Perhaps both a programmatic org for one passion and a foundation for another. So good luck to you!