Freedom to Marry Action Inc

What it reported doing in 2016

See schedule ostrategic wind-down - as promised from our inception - and having accomplished our mission of winning marriage nationwide -freedom to marry's board of directors formally voted in 2015 to dissolve the organization in a smart strategic fashion. The primary goal in this wind-down was to document and preserve the story of how we won the freedom to marry and make it accessible to those seeking to achieve other areas of social change. With our victory in hand (and having celebrated the win the night before at a gathering of 1000 supporters, along with vice president biden and the songs of carly rae jepsen), our team met in july, 2015 to discuss the plans for our strategic wind-down. Our digital team immediately turned to transforming our action website into a legacy/lessons site, with information on how marriage was won, the lessons learned along the way and the role of freedom to marry in that effort. We launched that site in january 2016 - www.freedomtomarry.org. It features a long-form narrative history of the movement's most significant milestones, analysis of the movement's messaging and most effective ads, and resources for best practices for winning victories at all levels. In addition, we continue to support the freedom to marry facebook page, which celebrates both how we won marriage nationwide along with the tremendous value of that victory for the many couples who are now marrying and for the country as a whole. We also crafted and aired online a six-minute video that chronicles the path of lgbt rights - including the freedom to marry - to the present day. The video traces the american journey from when gay people were a hated minority to now, when same-sex couples are finally, once and for all, free to marry. The victory celebration video was produced by the same team, eyepop productions, that worked on "the freedom to marry," a documentary on our movement's success and the campaign to win marriage nationwide. Premiering at the san francisco gay and lesbian film festival on the anniversary of the marriage decision by the united states supreme court, the film is a definitive history of the work to win the freedom to marry in the united states, from a 1973 nbc poll - which cited 52 percent of americans as homophobic - to the iconic moment when rainbow flag-wielding equal rights fighters bolted down the stairs in front of the u.s. Supreme court in june 2015. It has won awards across the country at film festivals and is poised to become a unique educational resource.with the decision to effect a strategic wind-down of freedom to marry, we also asked all staff to sift and organize their files so they can archive their work, their email and their online output for donation to the permanent archives at yale university library and the one archives at the university of southern California, and thus have it available for use by future researchers and other movements. Those archives were completed and organized for transfer to the respective archives throughout 2016. In 2016, freedom to marry substantially completed a project with the oral history center of the university of California - berkeley to film and preserve over 70 hours of recollections and insights from the years of work by freedom to marry staff, board, and movement partners. Lastly we began preparing to formally close down our operation. We closed our dc office in the summer of 2015 and the ny office was closed in early 2016. Our final payroll was made on december 31, 2015, and our last financial transactions occurred in september, 2016 when all bank accounts were closed. With our work to win marriage nationwide complete, we distributed freedom to marry's remaining assets to a mix of groups doing complementary work. Grants went to lambda legal, gay and lesbian advocates and defenders (glad), the national center for lesbian rights (nclr), the american civil liberties union's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender project (aclu), and freedom for all americ

Financial Efficiency

• Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
• Program expense ratio: 99.5%; rating input score 99
• Fundraising efficiency: Limited

Transparency & Controls

• Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 62nd percentile among comparable filings
• Pay-setting controls: 0 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 0
  • Compensation committee: Missing
  • Independent consultant: Missing
  • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
  • Written employment contract: Missing
  • Compensation survey or study: Missing
  • Board or committee approval: Missing
• Foreign activity oversight: Limited
• Grant itemization coverage: 100%; rating input score 100; 58th percentile among comparable filings
• Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
• Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

• Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 64th percentile among comparable filings
• Governance controls: 8 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 89
  • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
  • Whistleblower policy: Pass
  • Document-retention policy: Pass
  • CEO compensation review process: Pass
  • Other executive compensation review process: Fail
  • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
  • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
  • Audit committee oversight: Pass
  • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

• Operating margin: -8,703.8%; rating input score 2; 2nd percentile among comparable filings
• Total-asset coverage ratio: 0; rating input score 2; 2nd percentile among comparable filings
• Liabilities to assets ratio: Limited
• Officer compensation ratio: 3.7%; rating input score 21; 21st percentile among comparable filings

Growth

• Program expense growth: -16.5% per year; rating input score 0; 28th percentile among comparable filings
• Revenue growth: -29.6% per year; rating input score 0; 18th percentile among comparable filings
• Asset growth: 5.6% per year; rating input score 100; 73rd percentile among comparable filings