Ryan & thinkers,
In California, in-kind volunteer valuation is $24.75 - how 'bout that!
we allocate for in-kind volunteer hours, but we've learned to be pretty rigorous about it. We make sure we only count volunteer's who signed in that day and worked a real shift, usually 3-4 hours. We don't count folks who just showed up or make estimates (we used to make estimates just to get started) The volunteers do work that we'd have to pay someone to do if volunteers were unavailable.
We use this in reporting our value to the community (impact) as well as part of a match for a government grant. I'm glad the valuation is generous, but in reality it's pretty fair as it costs extra money to pay people money for their work (payroll deductions, unemployment insurance, workers comp, etc). The whole budgeting exercise gives me new found appreciation for our volunteer work!!!
I'm really interested in this thread if others have valuation for their in-kind goods and services and how they account for those in budgeting.