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Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

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Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#11

Post by nongaap »

bickfordb wrote: post #9
whbk wrote: post #2

Wow. Marie Knox, the woman that has already admitted to stealing the money, has her hands in a lot of different organizations in the Bay Area. She was the cashier, website manager, and person responsible for ordering inventory at her last position. Sure hope her past employers/nonprofits are all checking their books closely now.. Good on Sudarshana Banerjee, who took her board responsibilities seriously and uncovered…

Or maybe this is a failure of the non-profit system: these charities are not required to make their finances transparent by the government or their funders

Transparency is very much part of the non-profit system. Non-Profits have to annually file an IRS Form 990 (it's like an annual report) which discloses finances and are required to have them available for public inspection during business hours.

Sounds like Hacker Dojo was not following the rules already in place to prevent this sort of abuse.

Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#15

Post by diskcat »

calcsam wrote: post #3

It's pretty clear that Hacker Dojo isn't the strictest about accounting. Just look at their membership fee -- $100 / month, pay if you want. That said, Hacker Dojo doesn't work because recurring revenue > expenses. They work because of the tremendous goodwill they've built up in the community and a devoted base of supporters who are willing to help. Organizational controls should be aimed to strengthen that support -…

It is exactly the tremendous goodwill that attracts the thieves and scammers.

Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#16

Post by diskcat »

bickfordb wrote: post #9
whbk wrote: post #2

Wow. Marie Knox, the woman that has already admitted to stealing the money, has her hands in a lot of different organizations in the Bay Area. She was the cashier, website manager, and person responsible for ordering inventory at her last position. Sure hope her past employers/nonprofits are all checking their books closely now.. Good on Sudarshana Banerjee, who took her board responsibilities seriously and uncovered…

Or maybe this is a failure of the non-profit system: these charities are not required to make their finances transparent by the government or their funders

Well the non-profit system isn't designed to allow people who embezzle money to be caught within a day or whatever. I don't think any accounting system is.

The fact that the thief is eventually caught shows that the system does work, and the amount of damage that has been done isn't fatal to the organisation.

There is going to have to be some amount of trust between the staff of an organisation and this trust can be abused to steal money, this is true in any organisation, it has nothing to do with being non-profit.

Finances are transparent to the public.

Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#17

Post by nongaap »

Having seen first hand a similar situation unfold, the most heartbreaking feeling is finding out a friend broke your trust. That said, you really can't fix the issues and protect friends at the same time. Things have to be cleaned up and trust restored.

The Board needs to be highly vigilant about pushing for transparency and getting outside independent help to get to the bottom of things.

I repeat. Financial mismanagement and abuse is not something you try to fix in-house. The reason being you really don't know who has had their hand in the cookie jar (on purpose or accidentally) and there is going to be incentive by some to not expose the skeletons and the laws broken.

People want to protect friends but the Board really needs to retain professionals to run a forensic audit, get a full picture of what happened, and put in the proper financial controls. Cost isn't an excuse. Many law and accounting firms offer pro-bono services to non-profits, and I'm sure there would be plenty of firms who would be happy to help Hacker Dojo clean things up.

Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#18

Post by Animats »

What a mess. I knew Hacker Dojo was having problems, but didn't know the details. I was a member for a while a few years ago, at the previous location, but just to take classes.

It's mostly a co-working space now. As of a year ago, people sat silently at laptops under harsh industrial lighting, coding apps into the night. Now that the get-rich-quick app boom is over, not sure what's going on there.

$199 per month is way too much. TechShop is only $125 a month, and they have a full machine shop, wood shop, electronics benches, paid staff, etc. Hacker Dojo is a bare space into which members bring stuff. I wondered where the money was going. Now we're finding out.

According to their web site, they're in the midst of a move, with the old location closed. It's not clear if the new location is open yet. Marie Knox (yes, the accused thief) is in charge of the move logistics.

Re: Disarray at the Hacker Dojo

#20

Post by ZanyProgrammer »

Animats wrote: post #18

What a mess. I knew Hacker Dojo was having problems, but didn't know the details. I was a member for a while a few years ago, at the previous location, but just to take classes. It's mostly a co-working space now. As of a year ago, people sat silently at laptops under harsh industrial lighting, coding apps into the night. Now that the get-rich-quick app boom is over, not sure what's going on there. $199 per month is…

Its too bad, the current location (I keep wanting to say new) has lots and lots of room for all that stuff if they wanted to have it.
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