Discover Tennessee, Inc. General Information Contact Information Nonprofit Discover Tennessee, Inc. Address P.O. Box 158503 Nashville, TN 37215 Phone (615) 601-0816 Web Site Web Site Facebook Facebook Twitter Twitter Email info@tailsofthetrail.org At A Glance Year of Incorporation 2015 Tails of the Trail 1
Mission & Impact Statements Mission To act as a Community Outreach program offering weekly public hikes with animal shelters/rescues. To exercise and socialize homeless dogs, reducing stress and euthanasia rates while increasing community awareness and adoptions. Additionally, Freedom Ride, newly launched in January 2018, is a Middle TN based dog relocation service. We reduce euthanasia while improving adoption rates by transporting from overpopulated facilities to no-kill shelters in the Midwest and Northeast. Background A first shelter dog hiking event was held in November 2014 under a local hiking meetup group. They ran 4 events in 9 months with 2 shelter partners. In 2015 two cofounders formed a 501(c)3. We now offer 12+ events per month and partner with 11 shelters. We have an 8-person Board of Directors plus a 10-person Operations Team, a volunteer staff >35 and Cash flow of about $25,000 per year. Impact 2017 accomplishments: April - we organized our first community dog festival in partnership with the historic Hermitage, successfully finding homes for 5 shelter dogs. Attendance hit 650 and was family-friendly including dogs. By our second anniversary in May: we had completed 179 events, reached 3403 volunteer participants who offered 7946 hours of service, walked 2500+ dogs and helped to adopt 422 dogs into their forever homes. We raised $26,000 in funds, earned our first grant and established a 7-person Board. We appeared on local news several times including a TV segment on TN Crossroads.2018 goals: present the 2nd annual community dog festival in partnership with The Hermitage, increase local press coverage (Channel 5 News and TN Crossroads), raise over $30,000 in funds, launch a Middle TN regional dog transport system to IA, IL, OH, NJ and DE and transport 200+ homeless dogs to no-kill shelters. Increase dog adoptions to over 750+ and add 2 new shelter partners. We wish to continually educate the community on the need for valuable spay/neuter initiatives while building our membership of volunteer hikers. Needs 1 - Raising Cashflow. We work hard to run numerous fundraisers while requesting participant donations but have not yet been successful in building reserves that will allow us to GIVEBACK to our shelter partners on a regular basis. We wish to exceed a Budget of ~$25,000.2 - Building Long Term Committed Volunteer Relationships. It takes a minimum of 5-15 trained volunteers to operate a safe event and we offer about 12 per month. We hope to expand our current team of ~50 to 100 persons so we can add more shelter partners and offer more monthly events to engage community volunteers. 3 - Community Awareness. We have received a fair amount of Press coverage throughout Nashville and nationally via BarkPost but are always seeking additional exposure so we can continue to grow and expand our reach. 4 - Corporate Partnerships. We are seeking a few health conscious dog loving advocates to partner with our organization. We offer Team Building events plus wish to partner for company matching donations. 5 - Affiliate Growth. We offer our program in the Nashville, Columbia, Clarksville and Knoxville areas of Tennessee as well as the greater Charlotte, NC area. We have pending growth for the Atlanta area in 2018 and wish to continue expanding on a national basis for ultimate long term success. Other ways to donate, support, or volunteer Donations are accepted on our website: http://www.tailsofthetrail.org/we are also listed on AmazonSmiles and Kroger Community Rewards. We offer about 12 shelter dog hiking events per month; volunteers can submit an RSVP via our Tails of the Trail Meetup.com site: https://www.meetup.com/tails-of-the-trail/ We welcome all volunteer support. Service Categories Primary Organization Category Animal Related / Animal Services NEC Secondary Organization Category 2
Public & Societal Benefit / Areas of Service Areas Served TN - Davidson TN - Cheatham TN - Maury TN - Montgomery TN - Williamson TN - Wilson Tennessee: Davidson County, Williamson County, Cheatham County, Maury County, Montgomery County, Wilson County and KnoxSouth Carolina: York CountyNorth Carolina: Mecklenburg Board Chair Statement This new organization has had many successes in a short period of time. Now the emphasis is on sustained growth and expansion. This can only be accomplished by successfully building corporate partnerships that share a mutual vision of serving their communities and advocating for shelter residents. CEO Statement We are a novelty to the dog advocacy world. We raise awareness throughout the communities we serve, exercise both humans and canines and help build better cities for pets. We offer a fully insured event and attract public participants of all ages: families with children, college students away from home pets, and persons with or without pets in their household. To my knowledge we are a unique organization that is being quite successful in raising awareness to shelter animals. 3
Programs Programs Tails of the Trail Description We act as a Community Outreach initiative, offering publicly attended hiking events in partnership with local Animal Controls/rescues. We exercise and socialize shelter dogs to reduce kennel stress and euthanasia rates while increasing community awareness and adoptions. Budget 25000 Category Animal-Related, General/Other Animal Protection & Welfare Population Served US,, Short Term Success Q2 2017 stats:events held - 193volunteers - 3666volunteer service hours - 8043dogs walked - 2766adoptions - 426 Long term Success Program Success Monitored By Improve health & wellness for > 2,000 humans and canines/year, create community awareness to shelter overpopulation and educate on spay/neuter needs, increase annual adoptions by 500+. We track our statistics per event. Examples of Program Success Shelter testimonials can be found on our website. Freedom Ride Description Freedom Ride is a Middle TN regional dog relocation collaborative transporting at-risk shelter dogs to no-kill rescues located within the Midwest and Northeast. We hope to rehome a minimum of 250+ dogs in our first year of operation starting in 2018. Budget 30,000 Category Animal-Related, General/Other Animal Protection & Welfare Population Served US,, Short Term Success This new program launched in January 2018. Long term Success Program Success Monitored By Examples of Program Success We seek to rehome about 250+ at-risk Middle TN shelter dogs per year starting in 2018. We hope to eliminate the need for euthanasia based upon shelter overpopulation. We are also focused on expanding community education relative to spay/neuter initiatives. We will be monitoring each transport run via an Excel spreadsheet, tracking volume of dogs relocated as well as adoption rates and timelines along with many others factors. Placing dogs into forever homes in under 14 days at underserved shelters outside of TN. CEO Comments There is a strong desire to build additional shelter partnerships to enable the offering of more events within Middle Tennessee and beyond. To accomplish this next step we must strengthen and grow our volunteer staff so we can effectively manage more event capacity. Hence public awareness via marketing events and corporate partnerships must be established to help spread the word to a greater audience.we are 4
currently expanding our audience of followers by participating in several public/community events (Musician's Corner/Dogville, Live on the Green, Barktoberfest, PittieFest, A Dog's Day at The Hermitage) and have generated marketing materials to create an impact. We also operate several Meetup sites based upon geographic affiliate locations, a corporate website, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts. We are increasing our Press relationships and have a continual following. 5
Governance Board Chair Board Chair Lisa G Thomas Company Affiliation Executive Director Term July 2016 to Dec 2018 Email lisa@tailsofthetrail.org Board Members Name Affiliation Status Kelly Bankston Affiliate Advisor Voting Dr. Caitlin Bentley Veterinary Advisor Voting Sarah Bradford Treasurer Voting Rachel Reynolds Secretary NonVoting Lisa G. Thomas President/Executive Director Voting Erik Thorngren Legal Counsel Voting Allen Wright HCA Voting Board Demographics - Ethnicity African American/Black 0 Asian American/Pacific Islander 0 Caucasian 7 Hispanic/Latino 0 Native American/American Indian 0 Other 0 0 Board Demographics - Gender Male 2 Female 6 Unspecified 0 Governance Board Term Lengths 2 Board Term Limits 4 Board Meeting Attendance % 90% Written Board Selection Criteria? Written Conflict of Interest Policy? No Yes Percentage Making Monetary Contributions 50% 6
Percentage Making In-Kind Contributions 100% Constituency Includes Client Representation Yes Number of Full Board Meetings Annually 4 Standing Committees Communications / Promotion / Publicity / Public Relations Marketing Operations Finance Development / Fund Development / Fund Raising / Grant Writing / Major Gifts CEO Comments As a fairly new organization, we find we spend ample time documenting our Policies & Procedures. We learn from our mistakes, educate to correct the issue and document for future record. 7
Management Executive Director/CEO Executive Director Term Start July 2016 Email Ms. Lisa G. Thomas lisa@tailsofthetrail.org Experience Cofounder of Tails of the Trail and Operations Director from May 2015- July 2016. Former 30 year Strategic Account Manager/Senior Sales Executive in the Healthcare IT industry. Experienced in building teams, creating executive solutions, writing business plans and strategic analysis. Also skilled in day-to-day operational tactics. Nonprofit volunteer experience with Big Brothers, Habitat for Humanity, Nashville Food Project and Williamson County Animal Center. Former CEOs Name Term Kelly Stewart Aug 2015 - July 2016 Staff Full Time Staff 0 Part Time Staff 14 Volunteers 35 Contractors 0 Retention Rate 75% Plans & Policies Does the organization have a documented Fundraising Plan? Under Development Does the organization have an approved Strategic Plan? Yes Number of years Strategic Plan Considers 1 When was Strategic Plan adopted? Jan 2018 In case of a change in leadership, is a Management Succession plan in place? No Does the organization have a Policies and Procedures Plan? Under Development Does the organization have a Nondiscrimination Policy? No Does the organization have a Whistle Blower Policy? No 8
Does the organization have a Document Destruction Policy? No Affiliations Affiliation Year Belmont University 2016 Senior Staff Mrs. Sarah Bradford Title Experience/Biography Treasurer Began with Tails of the Trail during its initial launch event in November, 2014. Will earn her Masters in Accounting in 2019. CEO Comments As a 100% volunteer organization, I see the sway of available resources throughout the year and seasonally. It is imperative that we attract and train committed individuals that have a strong desire to be a part of our organization on a long term basis. Exposure to local Press and Meetup.com assists us in finding both staffing and participant resources. 9
Financials Fiscal Year Fiscal Year Start Jan 01 2018 Fiscal Year End Dec 31 2018 Projected Revenue $25,000.00 Projected Expenses $24,123.00 Endowment Value $0.00 Endowment Spending Policy Income Only Endowment Spending Percentage (if selected) 0% Detailed Financials Revenue and Expenses Total Revenue $0 $0 $0 Total Expenses $0 $0 $0 Revenue Sources Foundation and Corporation $0 $0 $0 Contributions Government Contributions $0 $0 $0 Federal $0 $0 $0 State $0 $0 $0 Local $0 $0 $0 Unspecified $0 $0 $0 Individual Contributions $0 $0 $0 Indirect Public Support $0 $0 $0 Earned Revenue $0 $0 $0 Investment Income, Net of Losses $0 $0 $0 Membership Dues $0 $0 $0 Special Events $0 $0 $0 Revenue In-Kind $0 $0 $0 Other $0 $0 $0 10
Expense Allocation Program Expense $0 $0 $0 Administration Expense $0 $0 $0 Fundraising Expense $0 $0 $0 Payments to Affiliates -- $0 $0 Total Revenue/Total Expenses -- -- -- Program Expense/Total Expenses -- -- -- Fundraising Expense/Contributed Revenue -- -- -- Assets and Liabilities Total Assets $0 $0 $0 Current Assets $0 $0 $0 Long-Term Liabilities $0 $0 $0 Current Liabilities $0 $0 $0 Total Net Assets $0 $0 $0 Short Term Solvency Current Ratio: Current Assets/Current Liabilities -- -- -- Long Term Solvency Long-Term Liabilities/Total Assets -- -- -- Top Funding Sources Top Funding Source & Dollar Amount -- -- -- Second Highest Funding Source & Dollar -- -- -- Amount Third Highest Funding Source & Dollar Amount -- -- -- Capital Campaign Is the organization currently conducting a Capital Campaign for an endowment or the purchase of a major asset? Yes Campaign Purpose A Q4 2017 capital campaign for $30,000 is underway to raise monies to purchase a transport vehicle for Freedom Ride. Capital Campaign Goal $30,000.00 Campaign Start and End Dates Sept 2017 to Dec 2018 Capital Campaign Raised-to-Date Amount $27,000.00 as of May 2018 Capital Campaign Anticipated in Next 5 Years? Yes State Charitable Solicitations Permit TN Charitable Solicitations Registration Yes - Expires June 2019 Organization Comments 11
We are always in a fundraising mode, seeking corporate sponsorships and donations as well as public assistance. Meeting our Budgets can be hard to accomplish with a limited volunteer base and as a new start up organization but we do persevere successfully to date. GivingMatters.com Financial Comments This organization filed a 990-N form with the IRS, which does not provide specific financial information. Most small tax-exempt organizations whose annual gross receipts are normally $50,000 or less ($25,000 for tax years ending after December 31, 2007 and before December 31, 2010) are required to electronically submit Form 990-N, also known as the e-postcard, unless they choose to file a complete Form 990 or Form 990-EZ instead. Comment provided by Nicole Rose 04/11/2018. Created 04.04.2019. Copyright 2019 The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee 12