Kanye West, prolific entertainer/fashion icon/celebrity/member of the Kardashian family needs our help!
Or so we thought.
After artist and rapper Kanye West let loose with a series of tweets earlier this month, claiming to be $53 million in debt, Jeremy Piatt launched a GoFundMe campaign to help out. Within 24 hours, Piatt’s campaign had raised about $25 towards the cause. With a bit of a push from social media, the total climbed to $289 the following day. And after about 10 days, the fund had reached nearly $8,000.
There’s just one problem: West doesn’t want the money. According to Piatt, “West’s camp was reached and they refused the funds.”
At that point, Piatt said, “he set out to find a charitable organization that would reflect the same goals of raising money to fund art.” And he thinks he found one: Notes for Notes.
From the GoFundMe site:
Notes for Notes® is a non-profit organization which builds, equips, and staffs after-school recording studios (inside Boys & Girls Clubs and after-school facilities) packed with guitars, drums, keys/synths, DJ gear, digital music stations and full recording studios offering youth completely FREE access to explore, create, and record music. Notes for Notes® currently has 11 studios in Boys & Girls Clubs and after-school sites in Santa Barbara, Nashville, LA, Brooklyn, San Francisco, Ventura, Atlanta, Detroit, and coming soon to Chicago, Austin, Cleveland, Memphis, NOLA, Minneapolis, Portland, San Diego and beyond. In addition to creating music Notes for Notes® also educates about the multitude of careers around the industry and the positive paths music can be the catalyst to.
The links to the organization’s website and social media sites are also included on the GoFundMe site:
Visit the Notes for Notes® website at www.notesfornotes.org
Add Notes for Notes® on Facebook at www.facebook.com/NotesforNotes
Follow Notes for Notes® on Twitter @NotesForNotes
That’s useful because it’s important to check out an organization before you make a donation. When doing your homework, if you intend to claim a charitable deduction on your tax return for your gift, you want to make sure that your donation is going to a qualified charitable organization. A search using the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Exempt Organizations Select Check reveals that Notes for Notes is on the list. To search on your own whether an exempt organization is eligible to receive tax-deductible charitable contributions, try using the Select Check Tool.
Of course, when making a donation to a charitable organization for income tax purposes, the normal IRS rules still apply no matter how the donation is framed. According to GoFundMe’s terms and conditions, “Campaigns are not charities to which you can make tax-deductible charitable contributions… As used in this Agreement, the term “Campaign” does not refer to a Charity, and you acknowledge that contributions to Campaigns are not deductible for U.S. federal income tax purposes as charitable contributions.” Generally, only donations made directly to qualifying organizations (not to individuals or funds) will result in a federal income tax deduction.
That doesn’t mean you still can’t be generous. More than 800 donors were willing to make non-charitable gifts to West (meaning there’s no corresponding tax deduction). Though the donee has changed, the tax consequences have not. That said, Piatt notes on the GoFundMe site that donors do have an option, writing, “Please note that anyone who previously made a donation intended to go to Kanye West is able to request a refund.”
Author’s Note: Philip Gilley, CEO/ Co-Founder of Notes for Notes, reached out to advise that the organization has checked with Go Fund Me and has clarified that donations to Notes for Notes are tax-deductible via the site. However, donors will need to request a letter from Notes for Notes to serve as a receipt/proof of the donation. The GoFundMe site has also been updated to note this.