Hope Creates

“All members of the board are provided with a draft copy of form 990 for approval prior to filing. In addition, Patrick Rohrkaste, Vice President, joined the board on July 7, 2023 to replace Larry Guess. Patrick is a retired CPA with over 42 years of experience in public accounting and over 30 years of experience serving nonprofits. Patrick set up a meeting with members of the finance and executive committee to review the draft form 990 to ensure that the are familiar with the form and the underlying details supporting the filing.”

“Hope Creates requires that all board members annually sign and read conflicts of interest. Also, Hope Creates annually shares with all board members the list of vendors and vendor payments. All new vendors are disclosed to the board of directors to ensure transparency and allows for any board members to disclose any conflicts of interest.”

“The executive committee and finance committee over the years has reviewed industry standards to determine starting pay for the executive director. This was used to make a recommendation to the board of directors, who voted in approval. Annually, the board of directors has reviewed salaries as part of the annual budget approval process, taking into consideration living adjustments and the financial health of the organization to approve appropriate increases in salary.”

“Hope Creates has posted on its website the most recently filed form 990. Other governing documents are made available to the public upon written request.”

“Our governing documents are made available to the public upon written request.”

“In fiscal year ended June 30, 2022, Hope Creates program "Community Creation Events " (CCE) included a newly defined sub-program component of CCE "Make Your M.A.R.C. (Music/Art/Recovery/Connection). For fiscal year June 30, 2023, Hope Creates has decided that Make Your M.A.R.C. has grown and should be a core program, and accordingly, this program is now separately reporting this as one of our 4 core program services.”

“Professional and contract services include grant writing, Let's Build Hope, and program services. Inkind accounting services and legal services of $30,613 are donated professional services, and accordingly, are not reflected in the form 990 revenues and expenses (book tax difference).”

“As a result of the first time audit of our financial records for fiscal year ended June 30 2023, beginning net assets without donor restrictions was previously reported on the 2021 form 990 as $118,121 as of June 30 2022. For the audit, this amount was reclassified as $108,671 (a reclassification amount reduction of $9,450). This same amount was reclassified to net assets with donor restrictions. So, for Line 28, the net assets with donor restrictions was previously reported as $15,336 on 2021 form 990 as of June 30 2022 and has been reclassified as $24,786 (reflecting the $9,450 reclassification increase due to the audit). Please note that total net assets per line 32 of $133,457 is unchanged in total as of June 30 2022.”

“Hope Creates just completed its first audit of the financial statements for the year ended June 30, 2023. The finance committee reviewed the audit results presented by the CPA firm and approved the audit, which was communicated to the board of directors.”