I would suggest that you take a vote of your PTA body to cover anyone later saying you over stepped your bounds. I would also suggest you get other PTO charters and review them to come up with one you can live with. We have a 501C3 designation but you do not have to have that right away, it will take alot of forms to be filled out to get one. Seems to me if you want to quit the national organization it couldn't be that hard, just don't pay those dues, then maybe they would get a clue.
I suggest that you make sure you contact the IRS and let them know that you will not be using your tax ID # any longer for non profit business. Then you can fill and out file your non profit papers to start your own non profit organization. After you do that you file at the IRS for another tax ID number and you are good to go. Good Luck and I hope your group always remembers that the children are first and foremost in all they do.
Anna in Louisiana
PTA Proud
check all your bylaws, local, state and national, and read them twice. Once we said we were thinking about leaving the PTA, it seemed like people were referring to bylaws left and right and saying we had to do this or that. Turns out there were some things in the our state's bylaws that were different than other states. You'll do better than us if you know the rules before you start making changes. In our case, we did wind up spending the money because the state PTA did say the money was theirs. It wasn't that hard to switch people just tried to make it seem hard.
Colorademom suggested spending all funds.Do funds get forfeited to PTA if not spent? What other steps need to be taken, i.e notifying PTA of intent to terminate, etc?
GOOD FOR YOU!!!
From the sounds of other PTA to PTO change-over postings on this forum, I'd say to make sure you spend all the funds under your PTA designation before you make the switch to becoming a PTO!
I'd also announce the plan right away - anyone left in the dark about the switch that isn't "on board" will create unforseen problems. Just like a business - changes are best accomplished with all constituients for the change and ready to move ahead positively! GOOD LUCK!!!
I am the current president of our school's PTA; we would like to start the process of changing from a PTA to a PTO but I don't know what a good starting point is.
Does anyone have any suggestions? We will have to make the school community aware of our intent and I would like to circulate a fact sheet to our parents once school starts next month (Aug. 28).
