Since the enactment of the Nonprofit Revitalization Act in 2013 (the “NPRA”), most New York nonprofits have been subject to a requirement that they adopt whistleblower policies. This requirement was expanded in both its reach and substance in January 2022, when additional protections affecting all employers were layered onto the existing ones affecting nonprofits. Having now had a decade plus of experience in drafting and administering nonprofit whistleblower policies, we thought it would be a good time to share some of our lessons learned.

These lessons broadly branch out from two central themes. The first is that whistleblower policies obey the “law of unintended consequences,” which dictates that any law or regulation intended to cause one specific consequence will in practice cause many, some of which will be perverse when considering the original intended goals.