By Charles M. Pickett
Learn from my experience: incorporate your VFW post immediately after you get your post number, but do it the easy way.
What’s the easy way? Use the standard Articles of Incorporation template available through the VFW Adjutant General’s Office. They can be found on VFW.org (My VFW (Resources) > VFW Training and Support, > Member and Officer Training, Forms and Templates (Additional Resources > Templates) > PostArticlesofIncorporationTemplate.doc).
Here are the dance steps:
- Download the Word document.
- Fill in the blanks and print.
- Get the signatures.
- Send to your Department (who will send to national to be submitted to the Commander-in-Chief for review)
- Get the OK from the VFW CIC.
- Then, use your Articles of Incorporation to submit to the proper state authority to incorporate.
- When you are incorporated and your VFW’s post full name is settled, then get an EIN from the IRS (Employer Identification Number) which takes 5 minutes online.
- THEN submit this EIN (email) to your Department to be included under their IRS Section 501 (c)(19) group exemption.
- Smile because you are incorporated and exempted the quick and easy way.
What is the hard way? Getting an EIN first, incorporating with Connecticut and guessing what verbage they want, going for an individual exemption with the IRS and guessing what verbage they want, having to submit additional paperwork because they wanted to see the $40 document from the Connecticut Secretary of the State, and then realizing after I was all done that this verbiage (PostArticlesofIncorporationTemplate.doc) is on the VFW.org website.
I must say, whoever is populating the VFW.org Training and Support section is making my life easier, especially the training documents.