11/25/25
My long-term goal, is to do a proof-of-concept sort of feeling-my-way for a year or two, and then start looking for funding. Then, I want to be the one that any group or individual can come to, and say “I want to build and maintain 25 Little Free Libraries but I need money.” Or “Our group has an opportunity to give away books at this giant event, but we need 15 tables and a banner.” And Books in Hand will be able to say, “Ok! Here is your money! Thank you for what you are doing!”
I want to be the one that takes care of the little paperwork details, and tax laws, and all the nonsense, so that the Little Free Library lovers can just do what they love. So that the people who want to give books to kids, can go and give books to kids. And so that they don’t have to be bogged down in the paperwork, to do the work-work.
But that means, that I’m the one who has to deal with the hassle, and frustration, and annoyance of the paperwork.
I remind myself of this, when I have days like yesterday. I remind myself of my motivation, of why I’m doing this, of the ultimate carrot in front of the horse.
I paid a company to manage the non-profit government paperwork. The first part went fine. I got the California paperwork and Federal EIN almost immediately. I called the company up, and asked what the process was for the 501c3, and they said that it was in progress. That was a month and a half ago.
Federal gov’t shut down. Federal gov’t opened back up. The 22 day batch processing period that should have included my 501 number turned into 45 days. And then…moved on to the next batch.
So, I used the text chat with the company that did my paperwork, and asked for the receipt info, that should have been dated Sept 30. It took the guy 30 minutes to even understand my question. Then he said, “Be assured, I have prepared a ticket, and your application will be processed.”
First of all, could all of these help-desk places please stop telling their people to use such artificial “repeat what the customer says but don’t really listen” speech patterns? I mean, if we’d had an actual conversation 30 minutes ago, rather than having the person just keep saying “I understand that you just said what you just said and now I’m repeating it,” I would have had 30 more minutes in my life.
Second of all … … … … … WHAT THE HECK?!
I got off chat, and called up the phone number. Spoke to a supervisor. Sure enough, they didn’t send my 501 app to the IRS because… Because they just…didn’t. They just didn’t. I had called and asked the status, and was told it was on track, and was lied to because they hadn’t even submitted it.
I had thought that I was going to have the number literally any day. Now I’ve missed the next batch by 2 days, so it’s going to be at least another 1.5 months.
And, this is when I remind myself… I’m doing this, so that, in 5 years, 100 other people don’t have to. So that in 5 years, I can create a structure that allows other people to do the work of putting books in peoples’ hands, and they don’t have to have this frustration.
My goal is to never make someone as frustrated as I was just made.
(And, in the meantime, I did look it up. I can still take donations, and write tax letters, because once the 501 is approved, it will be retroactive to 9/22/25. I just have to put legal verbiage into everything, saying “There is no advanced assurance of deductibility.”)
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