OK.. let's see if I can get everything answered in one post. :)
First, you should come to the weekly meetings. If you're not coming to the weekly meetings, you're not getting the whole picture. It's where we discuss and through consensus come up with a 'yea..let's do that' or a 'no.. bad idea' decision.
There isn't a deposit on the mall space yet. It's only good for a few months so we're paying 1 mo. 'rent' ($500) and 1 month 'deposit' ($500) at once. So, $1000 to move in then $500 mo. We're also paying for 1 year of insurance ($1M per instance, $2M aggregate general liability and $500K property damage). Insurance is required by the lease (here, or anywhere else we go). This is a one time (annual) fee of about $700.
Jeff's visualization was about right, except for the numbers.
Here's what we've gone over and agreed to in the meetings numberwise:
Starving hacker/Student monthly: $25
Regular member monthly: $50
Entire Family monthly: $75
As an aside, these are low monthly fees. Boulder's hackerspace (Solid State Depot) is $65 mo. for regular members. Pumpstationone is $70 mo. for a regular membership. Denver's Denhac numbers are identical to ours (and they are considering raising them because 'they're so low').
The $300 I mentioned is what the average hackerspace founding group (i.e. 'Foundering Members") of people put in to get things going. One time. It's to pay for the initial startup costs of renting a space, getting insurance, outfitting it a bit, etc. The more you get the more you can do.
In answer to Lars C (who asked some good questions):
1) The business plan is simple. Put together a physical space where makers can create, collaborate, teach and share knowledge. Charge membership fees to cover the basic costs of rent/utils/insurance. Take donations (and loans) of equipment from members and local community entities and take donations of money (hence, the need for a 501(c)3, making said donations tax deductable).
A couple of thousand hackerspaces started with this business plan. Denhac (of which I'm on the board of) has this as it's business plan and it's been around 5 years and is going strong. As discussed in the meetings, we all seemed fine with this approach.
Also, an investment of $300 is, well, not exactly a huge investment. If you're not comfortable making it, no worries. Don't throw in.
2) The way the money's being controlled is outlined in the By-Laws. We formed a subcommittee which come up with these by-laws:
Everyone was invited to participate online and then, at an in person meeting, we finalized them. So, these are the by-laws we'll be starting with. The TL:DR version is: the board controls the money. The board appoints a Treasurer, who is responsible for controlling the money under the boards direction. (Section 3, subsection iv.).
3) What are the determining factors of being a broke hacker: This was a big discussion at Denhac as well (but it was 'what defines a 'student'). We decided to trust our members to be honest. If you are a starving hacker (not much money) or a student (defined as: you say you're a student)... well, then you are. Trust your members. if they aren't a starving hacker (because, you know.. they just came back with a nice tan from Belize), everyone will figure it out soon enough and we'll have a talk with that member on the side.
4) "Jumping on a space" before we have the money and things are thought through isn't really what's going on. We've talked it through pretty thoroughly actually but you have to come to the meetings to do that. The majority voted to jump on the space. Both via online poll (
http://www.meetup.com/LongmontHackerSpace/polls/854252/) and in the last meeting (by a larger majority than the poll).
5) Having 501(c)3 status is what makes you real: Not so. Denhac ran for 4 years without 501(c)3 designation. It was 'merely' a Colorado Non Profit corporation (just like TinkerMill is at the moment). Anyone who's been there can see that it's a pretty well stocked hackerspace. It only got the 501(c)3 designation in March of this year. And that was only because I wanted it to get a Low Power FM broadcast license at Denhac (the FCC gives preference to 501(c)3 orgs for LPFM licenses). That said: it's a big advantage. We should do it now. But it is definitely not required in order to start a solid, well grounded, organization.
The cost of a getting a 501(c)3 can vary, but Denhac paid about $1800. And, we just did this-so that's a pretty fresh data point. It took us 60 days from the time we submitted the application to the IRS to getting the letter of determination saying we were granted the federal non profit status. The breakdown of that cost: $850 fee to the IRS. $500 fee to the CPA firm specializing in filling out 501(c)3 forms to ensure they were approved (and approved quickly, i.e. no questions, back and forth, etc.). $450 to our own CPA to 'check' the other specialist CPA (in GA.) to make sure what they were doing wasn't going to get us in trouble (Denhac's Treasurer is thorough, and..maybe a little paranoid). So, technically, you could do it for $1350 if you didn't want to verify (which might be safe now that we know the firm in GA is legit and it delivers).
Long response, I know.. but hopefully that answers most of the questions/concerns.
Scott