These are indicative totals based on the FEC Financial reports covering March 2024..
Total receipts were $129,734.46.
Total expenditures were $151,022.75.
Cash on hand at the end of the month was $218,354.72.
Payments were made to outside experts.
Frye and Company, CPAs received $18,500
All in One Acounting received $8569.
Oliver Hall’s retainer was $4500.
Matthew Hudson received $4200 for web site consulting
Freedom Calls received $4200.
Paula Edwards made $4000 as our FEC Expert.
David Aiken received 1238.75 for CiviCRM and candidate support,
Brian McWilliams received $1000 for fundraising
Mitchell Wiecek received $500 for fundraising consulting
Andre Giron received $650 for website consulting.
Dylan Allman received $211 for twitter ads.
Money handling included $286 in bank fees and $4958 in credit card fees.
There were fundraising and similar expenses. Stigler printing was $9208. Muck Rack and Mythos Media received $7492 for fundraising expense–Public relations. Print Connection received $1815. Postal costs were $927. Paypal received $324, Kixie received $155, and Twilio received $400 for fundraising.
Software, Hardware, and other IT came to $7655, including $1882 to Google and $1000 to Joinery.
A&D received $400 and Trimark received $210 for cleaning services. Other office related expenses were under $1000.
Total employee pay was $33,500. Note that employee pay is being made biweekly, this was a three payment month, so in a two-payment month this total would have been $22,367.
Federal taxes on this amount came to $9291. 401K payments came to $3990. Paychex Flex cost $2304 for PayRoll Service Fees. Care First Bluechoice was $2180 and Humana was $150 for health insurance. Better Termite received $81 for payroll service fees. The Texas workforce commission took another $60. The Virginia Department of Taxation came to $10. The total of these is $18066, so they amount to modestly more than half of the payroll dollars actually given to employees.
Amazon received $497 for general convention expenses. Travel, Meeting, and Meals was $96.
American Liberty consulting received $4000 for ballot access expenses. $3500 was paid to the North Dakota LP and $62 was paid to the Alaska LP. Voter Gravity cost $3000. Outreach and activism came to $1781 to Buffer Plan, Goulash Media, and Streamyard. $345 to Extra Space helped preserve our heritage.
Certain things stand out SHOUTING RED – but nothing more than this:
Total receipts were $129,734.46.
Total expenditures were $151,022.75.
Note this includes convention revenue. At best they did perhaps $100K in non-convention but more – likely about $90K.
Expenses have NOT been curtained as they had many times previously under different LNC’s during times of financial distress. The payroll company fees alone are currently running 10 x what the prior payroll company charged. The agreement which should never had been signed should have been tossed months ago. Either replaced with another much cheaper service like they had or perhaps their esteemed accounting firm could include this in their ridiculous fee – after all that was only supposed to run $2-3K a month. They should get something for their money aside from the headaches the next LNC & Treasurer will have trying to clean up this mess.
Obviously Muck Rack and Mythos Media did not “earn: their keep unless the commissions are far higher than they should be for fundraising. Take this in house immediately. Don’t know what Freedom Calls is but would like to know if that produced any revenue. Finally why is there any costs really aside from electric & water for an HQ building that’s closed?
As I pointed out a few months ago the solutions are simple: Basically all contractor hours & hourly staff should have been cut down by 25% or more. Any staff that is not directly bringing in revenue should be looked at very carefully to see if they are adding value or at least saving the organization money. If they can not justify their existence then they need to be replaced or let go.
It also makes me very nervous that I do not see any deposits/payments to major convention vendors. 3 weeks from now some of them will supposedly come to start setting up. Previously according to FEC filings these vendors often received half their payments up front at least a year in advance. At this point I would be very very nervous some vendors may not show in which case expenses can be triple or more if you rely on the venue.
This whole situation is very sad – & just gets worse while the Chair & other officers keep saying how wonderful everything is. Makes you wonder what they’re smoking & if they can bring some of the good stuff to DC for the rest of us!