Unavco Inc

“The organization amended its bylaws in december 2013 to increase the number of directors to 9.”

“The organization has members. See the response to line 7a.”

“The organization has members that elect the board.”

“Changes to the organization's bylaws are subject to approval by the members.”

“The board approves the form 990 and the president reviews and signs form 990.”

“Forms are sent to the employees annually by human resources. The human resources department reviews the returned forms. Forms indicating conflicts are given to the president for review. Approved potential conflicts are signed off by the president. Board members sign conflict of interest forms upon election and are required to disclose any changes during their terms.”

“Form 990, part vi, section b, line 15a: compensation of the president is approved by the board and the primary sponsor, the national science foundation. Form 990, part vi, section b, line 15b: salary increases for key employees are approved by the president.”

“The governing documents, conflict of interest policy and financial statements are available from the website of the organization.”

“The organization has entered into an agreement with the university of texas system whereby the university system provides an employee to serve as the director of geodetic infrastructure for unavco. Unavco reimburses the university system for the cost of the employee's salary, fringe benefits, and associated administrative expenses. The total amount paid by unavco to the university system was $185,569 for the year ended december 31, 2013.”

“Retrospective change in accounting principle 1,668,594.”

“The process has not changed from the prior year.”

“The organization's "operations" in boycotting countries - as part of its research mission, unavco archives gnss/gps data and data products to support university and other research investigators in their use of geophysical sensor technology for earth sciences research. Permanent stations located in the following boycotting countries transmit data that is freely available to anyone in the world and this data is obtained by the organization via satellite feed and stored in their data archive: iraq, saudia arabia, and kuwait. The data archive process is conducted outside of the boycotting countries and data may be used by members to benefit earth science research in the boycotting countries. The irs requires reporting on form 5713 when a u.s. Taxpayer has "operations" in or related to a boycotting country and provides for significant penalties if this form is not filed when required. The term "operations" is very broadly defined under these rules and the mere act of obtaining free data from these stations located in the boycotting countries could presumably be held to be "operations". In order to alleviate the risk of these penalties, the organization is filing form 5713 although it does not believe the activities described previously should rise to the level of being considered "operations" in these countries.”