Kansas City Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for the Arts

Danielle Merrick, executive director of Kansas City Volunteer Lawyers & Accountants for the Arts, spoke at an "Ask the Experts" plan at the Kansas City Artists Coalition in September 2019. (photograph by Marissa Starke)

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You might not expect a burn-eating, sword-swallowing performance artist to slay legal and bookkeeping dragons, yet such is the case with Martika Daniels.

Just Daniels, a performance creative person, doesn't face those dragons alone. She is one of many Kansas Metropolis area artists who accept received valuable career-enhancing guidance from KC Volunteer Lawyers & Accountants for the Arts (KCVLAA).

Daniels said soaking upward information at KCVLAA workshops helped her find an accountant who assisted her with revenue enhancement issues and articles of incorporation. The organization also led her to a lawyer who guided her through the intricacies of copywriting and other legal aspects of publishing a children'south book.

"Information technology has helped my business and pushed it in a direction I didn't recollect was possible, because I didn't know what I needed to know," Daniels said. "Those workshops saved me thousands of dollars in time. And because I got my concern license and learned to do all the right things, I've been able to get two COVID business loans."

The nonprofit KCVLAA started in 2004 with the encouragement of the Missouri Arts Council, the Arts Council of Metropolitan Kansas Metropolis, the St. Louis Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for the Arts and the Texas Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for the Arts. Its website states that "without KCVLAA, the legal and accounting problems of many artists and arts organizations would become unresolved. KCVLAA provides a critical link betwixt members of the legal, business and arts communities."

Danielle Merrick, KCVLAA executive director, said "a pretty practiced clamper of the population engages in some sort of creative work that benefits the economic system. If the arts were to disappear from the Kansas Metropolis metro, there would exist a measurable and substantial economic touch."

Debra Smith, a self-employed textile artist who joined the KCVLAA board a few years agone, said the organization recommended attorneys to her when an auto accident prevented her from attending a gathering of local art patrons.

"I lost the opportunity to meet some of the most distinguished patrons in the Kansas City community because of this blow," Smith said. "Information technology was an incalculable loss because it involved the building of future relationships and opportunities. I had a conversation with two lawyers, and they helped guide me in the linguistic communication I needed to facilitate the closing of the instance."

When Smith was in Roswell, New Mexico, earlier this year she received a alphabetic character informing her that she owed Kansas Urban center, Missouri, 3 years' worth of "city tax," constituting what she characterized as "epic fines and interest."

Screen shot from an April 2021 Zoom phone call featuring KCVLAA and the St. Louis Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for the Arts using a game testify format to jointly present legal and accounting information essential to nonprofit arts organizations. (Kansas City Volunteer Lawyers & Accounts for the Arts)

The letter of the alphabet referred to Kansas Urban center's one percentage earnings tax. Smith said she had not been familiar with the earnings revenue enhancement because, every bit a self-employed person, an employer had never deducted it from her pay. She told Merrick near the alphabetic character, and Merrick recommended that she talk to Dean Vivian, a tax preparer who worked for many years as an actor and voice-over artist.

So Smith tracked downwardly Vivian. "He spoke to me for over an 60 minutes on a Sunday. He helped me look at my documents and confirmed that the numbers the city was request for were right."

Vivian said cocky-employed, "gig economy" artists must go along records they can apply to justify income taxation deductions, especially in light of taxation law changes that have generated heightened scrutiny of self-employed individuals.

"They should exist sure that they're following the rules the way the IRS wants them to," Vivian said. "Every bit long as they know how to keep records and what records to continue, they're fine. Be completely honest with your income and your deductions and sleep well at night, knowing that when your day comes for the audit, yous but become in there and prove everything to the penny."

Merrick said the COVID-19 pandemic forced KCVLAA to transition in-person events such as workshops online. Some events had to be suspended.

"The flipside is we've had a meliorate outreach with an online surround for some of our events, because we had people who were non able to become off work, travel to an effect, attend the event and go back to piece of work the same day," she said.

Merrick said consultations accept lent themselves well to online formats such as Zoom. "Every third Thursday of the month, we do 45 minutes of complimentary consultations with artists. They can speak to a fiscal professional person or an attorney for free for 45 minutes. With the power of Zoom we tin create breakout rooms and put people into individual rooms."

Lawyers and a sign language interpreter speak with a customer (not pictured) during the "Enquire the Experts" program at the Kansas Urban center Artists Coalition in September 2019. (photo by Debra Smith)

Smith said serving on the KCVLAA board has enabled her to learn more nigh the organization, and she wants to spread the discussion far and wide. She said KCVLAA needs $iv,000 to $7,000 to update its website, including enhancements to make it attainable to individuals who are deaf and blind. "During this fourth dimension of COVID, the ability to share data through a computer has become even more than important," she said.

According to the KCVLAA website, those seeking help from the system will be asked to go a member. Members pay an annual membership fee. Private artists pay $50, full-fourth dimension students pay $25, and organization memberships range from $50 to $400, depending on the arrangement's almanac budget. Those who don't desire to become members must pay a one-time non-refundable fee of $25. The volunteer chaser or auditor to whom your case is assigned will provide services at no accuse. You may be required to pay for direct expenses such as government filing fees or taxes that are necessary for your representation.

Merrick, who is an attorney and a constabulary professor at the Academy of Missouri-Kansas City, said about 190 volunteer lawyers and accountants work with KCVLAA. Volunteers are not obligated to have a sure number of cases, and there's no orientation to go through. "I get lawyers and accountants in various stages of their careers that volunteer with usa," she said.

Merrick said it's not hard to recruit and retain volunteer attorneys, because almost attorneys who work for firms that bill by the hour are immune to deduct pro bono or volunteer hours from their billable hours' requirement.

Accounting firms are more likely to provide budgetary contributions or sponsorship as opposed to pro bono services, Merrick said. She'd like to see more accountants volunteer. "Nosotros go a lot of questions from artists that most accountants would exist able to respond in their sleep. Almost of our clients need less than five hours of service."

Lawyers and accountants who wish to volunteer may do then via the organisation'due south website, www.kcvlaa.org.

"If you volunteer nosotros send y'all a list of cases, and if you are interested in those cases just permit me know," Merrick said.

Merrick said those who have additional questions about the organization may contact her at admin@kcvlaa.org.

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Source: https://kcstudio.org/kcvlaa-helping-artists-navigate-legal-and-accounting-issues/