The Internal Revenue Service is offering one-day workshops for small- and mid-sized charities that want to know more about how to maintain their tax-exempt status and comply with federal laws.

The workshops are designed for administrators or volunteers who are responsible for their organizations’ tax compliance.

The workshops are scheduled for November 13-15 in Salt Lake City; December 4 to 6 in Columbia, S.C.; and December 18 to 20 in Sacramento, Calif.

Go to the IRS Web site for more information.

Community Catalyst — a Boston consumer health advocacy group — is pushing lawmakers to change the standards that govern nonprofit hospitals.

The organization on Thursday said it has sent a recommendation to Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa that Congress require nonprofit hospitals to provide free care equivalent to at least 5 percent of their annual revenue or operating expenses to maintain their nonprofit status.

It also calls on nonprofit hospitals to provide free care for all patients up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level and partial free care for all patients between 200 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty level.

Aides to Mr. Grassley have been promoting similar measures in recent months, though Sen. Max Baucus — the Montana Democrat and the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee — has said such reform is not a top priority given the committee’s other agenda...

A Wednesday hearing of the Senate Finance Committee on overseas investments because the platform for a discussion of whether college and universities should be required to distribute a minimum percentage of their assets each year.

During testimony, Jane G. Gravelle, a senior specialist for economic policy at the Congressional Research Service, told lawmakers that college and university endowments earned an overall return of 15.3 percent in 2006.

Those same endowments, however, spent 4.6 percent of their earnings last year.

For institutions that had endowments larger than $1-billion, the total distributed for aid to undergraduate students was 2.85 percent of total endowments.

The conclusion? Some observers say the federal government is letting these institutions fatten their endowments tax-free without turning out enough money on the other side.

Ms. Gravelle says Congress...

Two key leaders of the Senate’s Finance Committee said today that universities and foundations should not be able to use overseas tax shelters to guard hedge fund investments from taxes.

Sen. Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, and Sen. Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican, said during a hearing on offshore tax issues, that institutions are not acting in the public;s interest when they use offshore accounts to lower their tax burden.

“The law requires nonprofit investors that invest directly in hedge-fund partnerships to pay the unrealized business income tax, known as UBIT,” Mr. Baucus said. “The policy behind the law is that tax-exempt entities should not be able to have an unfair advantage over taxpaying entities doing the same thing.

Mr. Grassley said nonprofit institutions that manage endowments are already receiving sizable tax...

Foundations are not doing enough to support the needs of minority and low-income communities, a nonprofit research group says.

The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy in Washington offered that assessment in anticipation of this afternoon’s hearing of the House Ways and Means subcommittee on oversight, which focuses on whether foundations and charities are doing enough to serve the needs of minorities.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis, the Georgia Democrat who chairs the committee, called the hearing because he believes the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina exposed gaps in the way the government and charities provide help to minorities.

Aaron Dorfman, NCRP’s executive director, said his organization’s analysis of foundation grant data shows that foundations are not doing enough to fill those gaps.

“Sadly, while there are notable exceptions, the numbers show that foundations...

Prominent executives from the American Red Cross and the Ford Foundation are among those who have been called to testify Tuesday before a key Congressional committee examining whether charities and foundations do enough to serve minorities.

The House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee is playing host to the executives as part of a hearing that will discuss whether the government needs to create new partnerships with nonprofit organizations to serve minorities more effectively.

The nonprofit world has been criticized in some circles because many donors choose to give their money to universities, museums, and other institutions with already large endowments — instead of poverty-relief or medical charities.

Nonprofit groups have also drawn criticism for not attracting a diverse enough mix of volunteers to serve on boards of directors.

Witnesses scheduled to appear at Tuesday’s...

Nonprofit groups can continue to invite members of Congress and their staff members to fund-raising events, under a measure that President Bush signed into law last week.

An early draft of the law, which was designed to tighten Congressional ethics rules, included language that would have prevented such appearances if the charity had hired lobbyists to represent their views in Congress. But, according to Independent Sector, a Washington organization that represents charities and foundations, that language was dropped before the legislation was passed.

But charities that hire lobbyists still have to be careful with such arrangements.

“The invitation to the event must come from the sponsoring charity and not another individual or organization, the net proceeds of the event must benefit a charity, and reimbursement of any related local transportation and lodging must be paid by the...

Small groups — those with $25,000 or less in annual revenue — now have a place to turn as they seek help complying with a new federal paperwork rule.

Starting in 2008, such groups will be required to file the new IRS Form 990-N informational return. The form asks basic questions and does not require the detailed responses that bigger groups must provide.

The Internal Revenue Service has posted an online question-and-answer page that helps organizations comply with the new rule.

Previously, small organizations had not been required to file any type of informational return with the IRS.