The Internal Revenue Service has issued two free updated handbooks for tax-exempt groups and donors.

The 14-page "Charitable Contributions: Substantiation and Disclosure Requirements," known as Publication 1771, "explains the federal tax law for organizations such as charities and churches that receive tax-deductible charitable contributions and for taxpayers who make contributions," the IRS said.

"There are record-keeping and substantiation rules imposed on donors of charitable contributions, and disclosure rules imposed on charities that receive certain quid pro quo disclosures," the IRS noted.

The 39-page "Tax-Exempt Organizations and Gaming," called Publication 3079, "will provide an exempt organization—whether it is running games already or deciding whether to start doing so—the information it needs to operate in a manner that will not jeopardize its exempt status or generate...

In a procedural move, the Senate has decided -- at least for now -- not to debate and vote on a controversial bill that is intended to lift the veil on who is paying for advertisements and other communications that could influence elections. Many advocacy groups had objected to a donor-disclosure provision in the bill.

The measure last month was passed by the House of Representatives in response to a Supreme Court ruling.

The bill, known as the Disclose Act, would require corporations that issue political communications, including many advocacy groups organized under Section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code, to reveal information about their donors.

The Senate in coming weeks could reconsider its position on whether to debate and vote on the measure.

The BBB Wise Giving Alliance, a major charity watchdog, has released a list of its standards that national charities most commonly fail to meet when the alliance evaluates them against its "20 Standards for Charity Accountability."

"Insufficient transparency, inadequate board activity, and the lack of assessment of charity effectiveness account for the most failures in compliance," the alliance said in a statement.

The Wise Giving Alliance said that evaluation of the charities that provided it with requested information in the past two years found that 56 percent of charities met all 20 standards while groups in the remaining 44 percent did not meet one or more of the standards.

"Unfortunately, it's evident that many charities have more work to do to satisfy the expectations of donors," said Art Taylor, chief executive of the Wise Giving Alliance.

Following are the alliance standards...

Greater involvement by nonprofit groups in advocacy and lobbying work will require support from organizations' boards of directors, according to nonprofit leaders in a new report.

Participants in a "roundtable" held by the Johns Hopkins Listening Post Project "broadly agreed that they often saw board reluctance to get involved in advocacy," the report said.

"Board members may be reluctant to engage in advocacy efforts because of perceived conflicts of interest, a misunderstanding of the laws and regulations governing advocacy involvement of nonprofits, political pressures and inclinations, or a desire not to alienate funders," said the report.

Peter Goldberg, chief executive of the Alliance for Children and Families, in Milwaukee, and chair of the Listening Post Steering Committee, told participants that the composition of boards has dramatically changed in the past 15 years.

"There ...

The House of Representatives has passed a controversial bill that is intended to lift the veil on who is paying for advertisements and other communications that could influence elections -- including nonprofit advocacy groups.

The measure was passed in response to a Supreme Court ruling earlier this year.

The bill would require corporations that issue political communications, including many advocacy groups organized under Section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code, to reveal information about their donors.

Many liberal nonprofit advocacy groups opposed the bill because of an exemption from its requirements that would benefit large membership organizations like the National Rifle Association.

Exemptions would be provided to advocacy groups that have more than 500,000 members, are more than a decade old, have a presence in all states, and raise 15 percent or less of their funds...

A new feature of a Web site devoted to tracking government subsidies allows the public to search a database for detailed information about federal grants to -- and contracts with -- nonprofit organizations.

The Web site, created by Subsidyscope, also provides information and analysis on federal loans and tax expenditures.

Subsidyscope, a project of Pew Charitable Trusts and the Sunlight Foundation, says it aims to make government subsidies "more transparent" to the public and policymakers.

"By aggregating information across sectors of the economy, Subsidyscope hopes to inform the debate over the creation of new subsidies and the efficacy of existing ones in a nonpartisan manner," said a statement from the project, which has previously posted data on federal transportation spending and bailout money for the financial industry.

The federal government gave $38-billion in grants to...

Sen. Charles E. Grassley, senior Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, is asking the Council on Foundations for information about the need for a proposed change in the way foundations pay excise tax on their net investment income.

Supporters of the proposal, which Mr. Grassley said is pending in the Senate as an amendment to a tax bill, say such a change would simplify the tax code for foundations and encourage grant makers to give more during the current economic hard times.

Foundations currently are subject to a 2-percent or a 1-percent tax. They can qualify for the lower rate in any year in which the percentage of assets they directed toward charitable distributions is larger than the average percentage of their distributions during the previous five years.

While the two-tier tax was intended as an incentive for foundations to give more, some lawmakers and foundation...

A committee of nonprofit experts that advises the Internal Revenue Service has developed a prototype of an "online tutorial" that the IRS could use to help managers and board members of charities "better understand the tax rules that govern executive compensation and their role in setting that compensation."

The proposed Webinar instructional guide would provide "step-by-step, plain-language advice" for charities in a wide range of areas, including "developing internal procedures and compensation comparables, reporting salary information in their IRS Form 990 filings, and maintaining appropriate records necessary" to follow the law and IRS regulations, according to a report from the Advisory Committee on Tax Exempt and Government Entities.

"The country has been engaged in an ongoing dialogue over what constitutes appropriate levels of compensation for all levels of society, both in the...

The House of Representatives has approved legislation to extend through the end of 2010 several key tax incentives for charitable donations, including one designed to encourage older people to make donations through their individual retirement accounts.

The bill, HR 4213, will be considered by the Senate when it returns to work the week of June 7.

Both the House and Senate had previously agreed to extend the charitable incentives, which expired at the end of 2009. But the two sides have had differences over how to merge their two versions of the bills and how to pay for the ideas included in the legislation.

The bill passed by the House would allow people age 70 1⁄2 and older to continue giving up to $100,000 a year tax-free from their individual retirement accounts to charity.

The bill would also extend tax provisions to encourage donations of property, food inventory, books to...

Americans reported making donations of $52.8-billion in noncash gifts in 2007, a 12.8-percent increase over the previous year, according to a new report from the Internal Revenue Service.

The figure covers gifts from taxpayers who said they made more than $500 worth of noncash gifts in the year.

The number of tax returns showing noncash donations increased by 12.3 percent, from 6.2 million in 2006 to 6.9 million in 2007.

The biggest shares of noncash contributions, said the report, consisted of corporate stock, clothing, land, and household items.

The IRS said the amount of donations of land increased by $1.8-billion, or 80.3 percent, from 2006 to 2007.

"This increase occurred despite the fact that the number of taxpayers donating land decreased 40 percent from 13,000 in 2006 to 7,800 in 2007," the IRS said. "The average land donation for these taxpayers increased from more than $17...