Established in 2007, Valley Nonprofit Resources offers both information and services to strengthen the more than 4,000 nonprofit organizations in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles. Welcome to VNR's website! Click on the buttons to your left and at the top to access many resources that can help you increase the effectiveness of your nonprofit.
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In the News
* VNR and the Human Interaction Research Institute announce the 6th edition of HIRI's Resource Directory for Nonprofit Capacity Building in Los Angeles County. Since 2003, this free Directory has helped nonprofits and funders connect with consultants, foundations, information and service centers, and other resources that can help strengthen nonprofits. To download a free copy, click on Resource Directory. Some of the Directory's listings are also right on the VNR website for visitors' convenience.
* This month we're also launching our one-minute VNR Website User Survey - see above. We encourage you to fill it out when you use our website, so we'll know how to better serve you. You also can suggest that colleagues use this Survey to conveniently add themselves to our eBlast list.
* More than 100 people attended the 2nd Annual MENDing Poverty Conference on June 4, 2009. Conference co-hosts MEND and VNR thank all those who planned, sponsored and participated in this event. For an overview of the conference, click on MENDing Poverty 2009 Report and to download conference materials click on MENDing Poverty 2009 Conference Materials.
* IdeaEncore Network is an online marketplace where nonprofits anywhere can share knowledge and information of all kinds and find all types of tools and documents they can use as is or adapt. Intellectual property rights are protected through Creative Commons, so that visitors can view items, but can only download them once they have registered and (if priced) purchased. Examples of free items on IdeaEncore (click on the item's title to download):
* Two Approaches to Strategic Planning, (from Nonprofit Management Strategies in San Diego)
* Capacity Assessment Survey, a 53-item self-administered survey of organizational capacities from the Nonprofit Resource Center in Sacramento
* Start Preparing Yesterday for the Redesigned 990 provides guidance for nonprofits to prepare for and file the new Form 990, including a "To Do" list for Boards.
To visit Idea Encore Network: http://www.ideaencore.com
All of us at VNR wish you a happy summer. We're spending it getting ready for the Fall, when we'll host a convening of nonprofits serving Latinos in the Valley, and put on workshops about Online Social Networking, Fundraising for Animal Welfare Agencies, and Latino Leadership Development ... just to name a few! Stay tuned for more details.
Staying Alive
VNR's Staying Alive Initiative provides workshops, information resources and technical assistance for Valley nonprofits about how to survive and thrive in the current hard economic times. A supplemental grant from the California Community Foundation helps support these activities (CCF is a major funder of VNR).
Upcoming workshops and other events, and new publications addressing nonprofit issues in the current recession, are listed below. For additional publications and other resources, go to Staying Alive Resources.
Upcoming VNR Workshops:
Additional workshops to help nonprofits cope with the recession are being developed and will be announced here on the VNR website.
New Publications:
Investing in Nonprofit Mergers and Alliances is a paper written by Bruce Boyd and Reginald Jones, and released through Arabella Philanthropic Investment Advisors. It explores the benefits of strategic collaboration by nonprofits as another means of surviving today's economic crisis. Nonprofit mergers and alliances are a sensitive subject for some. Donors are cautious of the changes and some nonprofit organizations view it as a last-ditch means of survival. However, such concerns shouldn't prevent an organization from investigating the potential benefits of these practices. To access this Brief go to:
http://arabellaadvisors.com/images/IB_files/Mergers.pdf.
VNR's Partners
Valley Nonprofit Resources is operated collaboratively by the nonprofit Human Interaction Research Institute (which has conducted research and provided technical assistance to the nonprofit sector since 1961), California State University, Northridge, MEND (the largest poverty services agency in the Valley), and Volunteer Center of Los Angeles (already a significant provider of capacity-building services to Valley nonprofits).
Photo of the San Fernando Valley courtesy of Randy Witt Productions
