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In every Alberta
community, the work of non-profit boards creates quality of life for Albertans.
They are the groups that support local environmental initiatives, local children's sports, local fire protection, emergency medial
They hold suppers,
golf tournaments, bottle drives and as many other fund raising activities as
they can to put a little money into the coffer to improve the services they
offer local communities.
When you consider
how vital many of these tasks are, it surprises me that they receive very
little support from our governments. Some get annual basic funding, but many
are simply a group of local citizens trying to address a need they see in the
community and they get very little support of any kind from anyone.
Over the years (which is a much
higher number than I’m going to mention here), I’ve worked on, with and for non-profit boards in Alberta. The challenge I see in that is
that every single non-profit board, including school districts and
municipalities, struggles to do its job because of time and money constraints.
If you are surprised to see municipalities and school boards in there to talk to a rural council member or school trustee about budgets.
I will admit that
at least those organizations get core funding from the province to keep the
lights on and have someone around to answer a phone. This is a luxury most
Alberta non-profits would love to have.
Although there are
many corporations that offer funds for all kinds of non-profit boards, no one
wants to fund office work or space. They want to see trees planted, kids on the
ball diamond, off-stream water systems adopted, but they do not want to pay for
an organization to have a person that coordinates those activities. That’s
where the bake sale comes in handy. However, you have to sell A LOT of cookies
to pay someone to manage a watershed stewardship group, an arts program or a soup kitchen.
This leads to what
many call creative financial reporting. This is to me one of the greatest
injustices we allow in our society. We take our Community Leaders; the
dedicated people who actually care enough to do something and put them in a
situation where they have to fudge numbers and exercise intense creative
writing skills to cover the costs of projects through the available funding
sources that refuse to fund people to do the work.
While I’m on a bit
of a rant about funding sources, I took part in an Alberta licensed casino to
raise funds for a community. This is where I learned we take our Community
Leaders and put them to work for society’s money laundering underbelly to earn
money for community projects. There they are, the most caring citizens of our
communities, exchanging $5,000 in chips for slimeballs clearly intelligent
enough to figure out a money making system better than what Alberta offers its
non-profit organizations. I find that very hard to stomach.
In order to be a
non-profit organization in Alberta, a group of no less than five people have to
get together, create a mandate and vision and apply to the government for
Society status. As a registered society, they can apply for whatever grants
they think they can get. Many of these folks have no idea of the risks and
responsibilities they accept by agreeing to be on a local board.
During my time
with the Board Development Program; which is one way Alberta offers support to
non-profits, I learned just how huge the risks are that we ask average citizens
to take on behalf of a cause they champion. As a board member of a registered
society, you accept complete responsibility for the financial functions of that
organization. Every penny that comes in and every penny that goes out can be
scrutinized through an audit and any shortcomings are the responsibility of the
board members.
Board members are
also completely responsible for any legal issues related to the registered society.
If you hold a picnic and someone chokes, the family can sue the Board as a
collective and as individuals. We live in a time where more people look to
legal action than ever before. I have often been amazed at the attempts to sue
I hear about. Even if the Board wins the case, the legal fees can be a real
burden. Generally I find Boards have an “it will never happen to us,” attitude
toward this risk and I wish them well with that.
Of course the
other aspect of this is that well organized societies spend some of those hard
come by grant funds to insure board members, hire accountants and generally
ensure risks are minimal for board members – and then fudge numbers. But for
many of the small community organizations that need it most, the money is just
not there. Maybe that’s why you don’t have a Little League in your
neighborhood.
The greatest
misfortune I see in all this is the missed opportunities for social benefit
caused by lack of non-profit capacity. Our communities miss out on grants no
one fills out; activities no one organizes; improvements no one can fund and
events no one puts together because the support system for non-profit
organizations in the province needs reworking.
Really, isn’t it
ironic that we pay taxes, but don’t see our local groups supported by those
dollars? Instead they have to engage in morally questionable activities, wait
on slimeballs and beg from businesses who are mostly interested in how it will
improve community acceptance of their business.
It gets to me!
