[foundation-board] Fwd: Charity Status.

Wed Jul 12 17:19:29 UTC 2017

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Mark Gibbs" <mark.gibbs at okfn.org>
Date: 6 Jul 2017 3:27 pm
Subject: Charity Status.
To: "Karin Christiansen (external)" <karin at karinchristiansen.org>
Cc: "Pavel Richter" <pavel.richter at okfn.org>, "Paul Walsh" <
paul.walsh at okfn.org>

Karin

I am sorry it took me some time to follow up on email, with reference to
our discussion regarding the Charity application I wanted to give you
further input to align the situation as of today.

The Commission during a recent telephone call are still not agreeing to a
charitable need as a public utility, they are very keen for us to pursue
the avenue of us being educational.  As you know from our discussions,
personally I have a huge concern in doing this, we would need to change our
articles of association, (no longer able to claim corporation tax that OK
historically paid) and the potentially add further limitations in regard to
how we can operate.  I think the audit practise alone would also be costly
and hinders our business.

To date we have spent in excess of £16000 in legal fees and ££3000 in time,
travel and expenses. I feel that to continue in what will become an appeal
has the potential of becoming even more costly.   In recent weeks, I learnt
from a call with Hewlett (David Sasaki) that we actually do not need to
have charitable status for us to continue receiving grants from Hewlett.
This as you will recall is a complete 180 to what we were originally led to
believe.  I have attached an email in pdf to this email.

I would like to put forward to yourself as Chair of the Open Knowledge
board and your fellow board members that Open Knowledge put the application
on hold for an indefinite time frame, I am not asking this to be forever
and maybe we could revisit the application again a few years down the
line.

I am happy to discuss at the upcoming board meeting, I await your response.

BR

Mark Gibbs

COO Open Knowledge International

Tel: 07784 465130

skype: osdorperweg

Open Knowledge International <http://okfn.org/>*    -    See how data can
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en Knowledge is a not-for-profit organisation.  It is incorporated in
England & Wales as a company limited by guarantee, with company number
05133759.  VAT Registration № GB 984404989. Registered office address: Open
Knowledge, St John’s Innovation Centre, Cowley Road, Cambridge CB4 0WS, UK.
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