Rancho Cucamonga Community & Arts Foundation

“Description of changes made to the organization's governing instruments during the year. Since its founding in 1988, the rancho cucamonga community & arts foundation has held a strong connection and collaborative relationship with the city of rancho cucamonga. The foundation was originally created by city council to assist with garnering or accepting financial support (through donations, campaigns, bequests, and grants) for city run programs and services related to cultural, recreational and human services. This close relationship continued over the years with most of the meeting management handled by the city manager's office. All new or renewing members to the board were appointed by city council, and all meetings were conducted under the brown act. This collaborative relationship accelerated in 2002 through 2006 in anticipation of the city's soon to be built victoria gardens cultural center & lewis family playhouse. It was at that time that the city partnered with both the rc community & arts foundation and the rc library foundation on a combined fundraising campaign (called the pal campaign promoting arts & literature) to raise 4 million dollars intended to support the new cultural center's programming. As a part of this intense collaborative relationship, and as the foundation's operational needs continued to grow due to the significant fundraising efforts, city staff conducted nearly all of the administrative duties, as the foundation has no staff of their own. The city's community services director officially served as the foundation's executive director. The extensive administrative support provided by the city included clerical, bookkeeping & banking functions, meeting management and preparation, correspondence, tax preparation, website development & maintenance, marketing, etc. The pal fundraising campaign ended in 2008 and the foundation's new direction was to continue raising funds annually to support the playhouse's arts programming, with the continued city staff support for administrative duties. This relationship status continued until 2018. In 2018, the city notified the rc community & arts foundation that they would no longer be providing city staff support to continue with the foundation's administrative functions (as listed above) upon the conclusion of the fiscal year, ending june 30, 2019. The foundation hired a part-time executive director in august 2018. Over the 2018/19 fiscal year, representatives from the city and foundation met to determine the new relationship and terms in a memorandum of understanding. The mou was signed in june 2019, clarifying each entity's responsibility to each other to maintain positive revenue through fundraising efforts to assist with continued support of the arts programming at the cultural center. As of july 1, 2019, the foundation become completely independent of the city. The foundation established a new business address and phone number. Board members will no longer be appointed by city council. Meetings are now conducted under roberts rules and are no longer public or on city property. In addition to the executive director's part time wages, the foundation also contracted a bookkeeper to maintain financials. All other services and administrative functions have become the responsibility of the executive director, the executive committee, or an outside service. This change in administration increased the foundation's operating costs significantly. Additionally, the board members are currently in process of updating their policies, including a document retention and destruction policy where the city's internal policy was in place. While the foundation remains committed to continue their assistance toward the arts programming and arts access to families & low-income at the city's cultural center (as is stated in the mou which includes a guaranteed funding amount per year), the foundation also decided to revise their mission statement to broaden the scope of arts to include”

“Line 11a explanation - the foundation's executive committee meets before the due date to review the tax return. Copies are then made available to board members prior to filing.”

“Organization requires board members to annually disclose interests that could give rise to conflicts. If a conflict is disclosed the board will follow the conflict of interest policy procedures.”

“Comparable data of similarly sized organizations and board approval”

“Governing documents and any financial information is available to others upon appropriate request and is presented to the governing board members.”

“Funds for the rc animal center had been held in the foundation's accounts until the incorporation of their own non-profit status was established. At that time, the funds were withdrawn from the foundation's account, along with those supporting other city-run programs including the rc senior center. The foundation no longer holds or distributes funds for city programs or services aside from arts programs as identified in our purpose.”