[Lnc-business] Proposed

Sat Jul 6 23:24:14 EDT 2019

The irony of fundraising is if you don't pay the fundraiser you're never going to get enough funding to be able do anything worth fundraising for. 

Major donors don't want panhandlers in suits knocking at their door asking for tens of thousands of dollars.  If they're going to invest in our organization, they want to speak to someone in charge. They want credible assurances that their contributions are going to be put to work effectively.

The longer we remain stingy with the development department, the more we risk all the other operations the party conducts.  We can't depend on memberships and a few of our longest donors to keep floating the party expenses, in fact, we do them a disservice to not put that money to work to grow and cultivate the donor base.

Our staff has done the best they could with the guidance and resources we provide.  Fundraising may be an art, but there is tested and proven fundraising science that we cannot ignore any longer.

Don't bother citing the past forty-five years of "success" the LP has had with the current model of unpaid volunteers and underpaid staff trying to manage the daily operations of the party while constantly undermined by unfiltered bickering.

I'm as wary as the next person about the corrupting quality of money in politics and the moths that might be drawn to that flame. We can't deny that other organizations, including the Democratic and Republican Parties, are effective at achieving their goals using these organization models and methods, regardless of the risks that lead to centralized power.  We have to find a way to mitigate those risks and improve the model to fit our needs, but we cannot straight up deny proven results.  

We know we have the best ideas, but we can't compete in the market of ideas because we can't compete with their organization, their fundraising, their mobilization, and they have the resources to crush us whenever we try.

Nothing is stronger than an idea whose time has come.

It's our job to be the vessel for these ideas. The fundraising is the fuel that powers this movement. 

This problem didn't start when Lauren announced her resignation, she's been dealing with it her whole tenure.  We need a solution to this problem ASAP.

-Jeff Lyons

LNC 8A 

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On Sat, Jul 6, 2019 at 9:36 PM -0500, "Daniel Fishman via Lnc-business" <lnc-business at hq.lp.org> wrote:

One of my long range goals is a permanently paid chair for the LP. It was
further down my agenda list, and I had presumed it would happen when we had
greater financial stability. When the opportunity presented itself now
though, I decided to try it out. And that means if it works we are talking
about the same option for whomever the chair is (and we've never elected a
chair to a 4th terms as far as I'm aware).

Of course a permanently paid chair is a convention level decision, but one
that can only be made if we can indeed afford it. Getting the financial
legs to stand on is what you brought me here for.

I'm a big believer in not being afraid to fail. In order to not fear
failure you must have metrics that can tell you if you are failing. This is
a pretty clear cut one. Any fundraising contractor will be expect to be
raising enough to cover their costs within a few months. And that includes
the Chair. If they can't, that's gets deemed a fail. We terminate the
experiment, learn from our mistakes and proceed to the next attempt.

To me this seems like a good roll of the dice, with relatively minimum risk
to the LNC. Almost all of the risk is borne by the Chair. I am asking to
put the Chair on the hot seat. Should any chair be contracted as a
fundraiser for the LNC and fail, the ramifications would reverberate till
the next convention. Should the chair succeed he benefits every future LNC
chair and future LNC by establishing the precedent that (I hope) will lead
the delegates to approving a permanently paid chair. I have essentially
asked the chair to put his head on the chopping block.

And it should be pointed out too Mr. Chair, that when I asked you if you
would be amenable you suggested I bring the idea to the LNC first. I have
done so, but you still have not actually indicated that you would indeed
accept the contract. I'm assuming you have been seeking counsel of your
own? Are you prepared to firmly commit to accepting a contract should one
be offered?

The chair is in a unique position to do things that will affect
fundraising, such as media appearances, published articles. As such the
unique position is one I think the LNC should try paying for to see if it
increases our revenue.

---
Daniel Fishman
Executive Director
The Libertarian Party
Join Us 

On Sat, Jul 6, 2019 at 3:45 PM Caryn Ann Harlos via Lnc-business <
lnc-business at hq.lp.org> wrote:

> It is already all of our jobs to fundraise.  Pay expenses? Certainly.
> Salary?  No.
>
> I volunteer - expenses only.
>
> Seriously after the shitstorm last year for legitimate fundraising it’s all
> of a sudden different because it’s Nick and with salary?  I was in danger
> of (ridiculously) of bribing votes with t-shirts but this is okay?
>
> Is Nick re-running?  Would there be no using of a salaried position to
> influence internal politics?
>
> I’ll say it right now, then every chair candidate must be given equal
> opportunity.
>
> On Sat, Jul 6, 2019 at 12:20 PM John Phillips via Lnc-business <
> lnc-business at hq.lp.org> wrote:
>
> > I think other people said that more recently than I, its been a few
> months
> > since I did 😂, tho I hinted at it.
> >
> > Well thought out as always.
> >
> >
> > John Phillips
> > Libertarian National Committee Region 6 Representative
> > Cell 217-412-5973
> >
> > On Jul 6, 2019 12:59 PM, Joe Bishop-Henchman via Lnc-business <
> > lnc-business at hq.lp.org> wrote:
> >
> > I guess Mr. Fishman's honeymoon period is over!
> >
> > I'm willing to hear out our ED and not shoot it down immediately, but
> > for my part I will need a lot more details when we consider it. If we're
> > hiring a contractor, I want to know precisely what tasks the contractor
> > will be doing on at least a quarterly basis if not a monthly or weekly
> > basis, and how (and who) will be actively monitoring progress and
> > adjusting based on the results.
> >
> > I will also need to review the information addressing whether this
> > violates the Bylaws or common past understandings of the role of the
> > Chair or LNC members.
> >
> > This contractor-who-knows-us approach would be preferable, in my view,
> > to hiring a commission fundraiser who knows little about us and
> > therefore will be ineffective at securing major donors willing to invest
> > long-term with us. In-person telemarketing, which is effectively what
> > that is, can be effective for raising money quickly, but only at
> > enormous expense (as a percent of dollar raised), great risk of
> > misrepresentation, and at the expense of a continuing relationship.
> >
> > Ideally we need to construct a fundraising department, essentially from
> > scratch now. We have two main donor audiences - major donors and small
> > dollar donors - and each of them needs attention as to their
> > prospecting/qualification/opening doors, asking/closing, and
> > stewardship/cultivation. That's essentially six completely different
> > skills (2 audiences times 3 jobs each) and we can't have one person do
> > all of it and expect them to do better than Lauren could. We also can't
> > hire six people, so the answer is going to be a mix of LNC members, the
> > ED, staff, and contractors.
> >
> > If we're going to get to a place where we are raising millions of
> > dollars or more each year, building a fundraising department is an
> > essential second step. (The first step is doing exciting things donors
> > want to support, or at least proposing to focus on those things. On that
> > part, I'd like to invite Apollo to the next Board meeting and tell us
> > what he has up his sleeves.) If what Mr. Fishman proposes is a step in
> > that direction, I'm more inclined to support it. If not, not.
> >
> > As Mr. Phillips I think noted, if we say no to everything and propose
> > nothing we will quickly realize in a bad way how important fundraising
> > is.
> >
> > JBH
> >
> > ------------
> > Joe Bishop-Henchman
> > LNC Member (At-Large)
> > joe.bishop-henchman at lp.org
> > www.facebook.com/groups/189510455174837
> >
> > On 2019-07-05 16:50, John Phillips via Lnc-business wrote:
> > > Then lets get hiring.
> >
> >
> > --
>
> *  In Liberty,*
>
> *Libertarian Party and Libertarian National Committee Secretary *-
> Caryn.Ann.
> Harlos at LP.org  or Secretary at LP.org.
> *Chair, LP Historical Preservation Committee* - LPedia at LP.org
> Call me at 561.523.2250 and follow my public figure page at
> facebook.com/pinkflameofliberty/
>
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