On Mon, 2015-03-16 at 17:50 -0700, Josh Andler wrote: 
On Mon, Mar 16, 2015 at 5:09 PM, Bryce Harrington
> True; it seems odd to specify a donation in the FSA itself.  Certainly,
> I could see it included in the FSA text if it's considered a required
> membership fee we must pay.  If it truly is up to us to optionally
> choose whether or not to donate and/or how much, then you could argue
> maybe it would be better handled as an independent matter?

This is why it doesn't feel right to me. If it's a requirement, I
would appreciate them being up front about that. If it's not, it's
doesn't seem appropriate to me and comes across that they either don't
trust us or it's an unspoken requirement.

My impression from Karen's e-mail was that she felt for previous to discussing the FSA a donation was reasonable, but for the future they'd prefer the 10%. I think that it is basically a requirement for organizations joining the Conservatory today, and that they're trying to work with existing projects to move all of them over to the same system. It keeps their accounting simple and consistent and I don't think it's an unreasonable amount for them to charge. I do agree with the idea of it being retroactive is a bad thing, but I don't have any issue about it going into the future.

Ted