Erica Harris is an assistant professor of accounting at the Rutgers School of Business-Camden.

CAMDEN — As the tax filing season begins to ramp up, many
nonprofit organizations are filling out a form for the very first time that
could have an impact on donors’ decisions to contribute money, according to a
Rutgers–Camden professor.

Erica Harris, an assistant professor of accounting at the Rutgers
School of Business–Camden, has received a Faculty Research Grant for $8,750
from the Rutgers–Camden Office for Research and Economic Development to
investigate the implications Tax Form 990 has on nonprofit organizations.

“Form 990 is a lot more cumbersome than it’s ever been,” Harris
explains. “It asks for many governance variables, for example, if an
organization has a written conflict of interest or a whistleblower policy.”

The revised tax form was first required in 2008, Harris says, but was
slowly phased in for small and large nonprofit organizations, so some are
filling it out for the first time this year.

Since all nonprofit organizations are tax exempt, Form 990 serves
to make an organization’s information available to the public. For example, the
new form asks for an organization mission statement in addition to both
financial and nonfinancial performance metrics.

It’s what the public does with the knowledge that most interests
Harris.

“The majority of my research looks at Form 990 to try and figure out
if donors use information organizations are reporting on the form to influence
their donation decisions,” Harris says. “What I’m hoping to find out is if individuals
are withholding donations to organizations that are poorly governed.”

Harris says nonprofit organizations that do not have a conflict of
interest policy, for example, could be rated poorly and, as a result, lose
donor support.

However, she says she’s not sure that the information required on
Form 990 is ultimately beneficial.

“We always think that more information is better, but are we
making better donation decisions because we have this new information?” Harris
asks.

It’s a question Harris hopes to answer when her ongoing research
is complete.

“Many small organizations say they have had to spend additional money
to gather the nonfinancial information necessary to complete the form and to implement
procedures they are not sure will directly benefit them,” Harris says. “A
whistleblower policy is an example of a standard that the largest nonprofit
organizations should absolutely have. It’s when we start talking about the
smaller organizations that we become unsure of the cost benefit.”

A Haddonfield resident, Harris teaches courses in cost accounting,
managerial accounting, and performance management and competitive strategy at
the Rutgers School of Business–Camden.

An expert in nonprofit accounting, Harris is also researching
topics like auditor reputation and its impact on nonprofit donors, the impact
of CEO salary on nonprofit contributions, transparency and nonprofit
contributions, and the impact of celebrity donations on other donors.

Harris received her bachelor’s degree from the University of
Florida, her MBA from the University of Miami, and her Ph.D. from Temple
University.

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