From the Ground Up: Moving Our Roots to California

If you saw our recent social media announcement, you know that the Dancing with Fireflies Foundation is officially on the move! We are packing up our operations in Tennessee and transplanting our roots directly into our own backyard here in California.

When you look at a nonprofit from the outside, you usually see the big, beautiful final results…the children helped and the goals met. But running a true, legitimate, legal nonprofit is not a hobby project. It is an immense amount of work, and so much of it goes completely unnoticed.

We want to pull back the curtain and share the real story of our journey so far, because true radical transparency is one of our core values.

Pivot, Rebuild, and Protect the Trust

It took months of intense, dedicated work to build our initial infrastructure from the ground up. Our founder and president, Jennifer Heitz, single-handedly managed the heavy lifting…navigating the complex legal paperwork, opening accounts, conducting exhaustive research, setting up our digital presence, and building out our fundraising plans. She even secured a pro bono partnership with Ashlar Nexus, who generously donated their tech services to build and secure our website completely free of charge.

However, as we prepared to transition from administrative setup to active field operations, it became clear that our out-of-state team members were no longer aligned with anchoring our Tennessee location, and they stepped down from their roles.

This brought us to a critical realization: you simply cannot run an impactful grassroots nonprofit without boots on the ground. Because the remaining leadership team all reside right here in California, the most responsible, logical choice was to pivot and transplant our roots here. This is our home, it is where our friends and family are, and this is the community we are meant to serve first.

We officially set this structural transition in motion at our May 31st board meeting, where the departure of the Tennessee team was finalized, the vote to relocate the foundation to California was passed, and our new local leadership board was established. Following that momentum, our board met again on June 15th to formally cast the votes approving our new California structural frameworks and legal transition plans.

These are massive milestones for us, but a transition like this is still an unexpected, expensive, and tedious task that we did not initially plan for.

Why the Paperwork Matters

We wanted to share a quick peek at what our “office space” looks like this week:

This is our current master plan! It might look like just a notebook, some colored pens, and a screen full of legal text, but to us, this is the blueprint for our future.

Right now, we are pouring our hearts into building and filing state documents, IRS forms, and structural frameworks. We are doing this because a 501(c)(3) is a “public trust.” We are incredibly strict about following every single rule and regulation required of us. We are putting in the heavy miles behind the scenes right now to ensure that our foundation is bulletproof, legally sound, and built to last.

Moving Forward with Absolute Intent

As a grassroots organization, everything we do is 100% volunteer-run. We are pouring our own time, energy, and hearts into this because we want to do real, tangible good for foster youth by providing them with apartment kits and comfort care bags.

Because we are volunteers navigating a massive legal relocation unexpectedly, we are asking our community for just a little bit of patience. Taking the time to do this right means we can hit the ground running with absolute confidence the moment our doors officially open in California.

While our social media pages will be a little quiet while we clear these final legal hurdles, this blog is going to be our official “captain’s log.” We will be posting updates here as we check off each step on our notebook roadmap.

Thank you all for holding on tight, understanding the realities of this journey, and standing by us as we build this next chapter. The best is truly yet to come.

With gratitude,

The Dancing with Fireflies Team