Hi Project Directors,

I hope you all had a restful weekend and a good start to this week.

Before I jump into today’s updates, I want to thank all of you who shared your feedback around the Rapid Response Fund grant governance and also the Temporary Wage Subsidy allocations. The Shared Platform team has talked previously about engaging with you all on big decisions that will impact projects, and these past couple of weeks have provided us a great opportunity to try this out. We are of course doing at a time when you all have many competing priorities, and I am still navigating how to best bring you in on these decisions (and even if you’d like me to). All that to say, I really do value and appreciate all the thoughts that were shared. The updates below have all been informed by your feedback and I’m pleased to be moving both of these activities forward.

• Temporary Wage Subsidy - Feedback from projects was overwhelmingly that the $25k in income tax deductions should be allocated to those projects that most need financial help to avoid layoffs.
  • Please reach out to the People & Culture team ([email protected]) this week if you are in the unfortunate situation of considering layoffs and/or reduced hours within the next 30-60 days and would like to access these funds. This will provide us with a clearer picture of which projects are impacted.
  • We’ll then work with Project Directors, People & Culture, Finance and Project Specialists to fill in any gaps in knowledge and start allocating the subsidies. We’ll aim to support as many projects as we can, though will make sure the subsidy targeted in a way that they can really make a difference.
  • In terms of timeline, we’re hoping to resolve this by the end of next week

• Rapid Response Fund: OPEN APRIL 23 – I have collated everyone’s feedback and worked with the Partnership Development team to build a simple yet effective application and decision-making process. Applications will open on Thursday April 23. We’ll share more considerations/process information then, however below are some highlights to help you prepare.
  • Grants will be awarded as either $3k or $5k for now, and the online application form will be very simple. We will only require a short paragraph detailing your proposed activities and a breakdown of budget will not be required. As such, there will be no formal reporting required either (though we hope projects would like to share their stories informally with our donors)
  • Funds will be in one of two streams for now (special thank you to Anne Gloger for articulating these so well in her feedback):
    • Mobilize: Immediate funding for projects providing critical support/resources to communities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Applications demonstrating support for vulnerable communities will be prioritized.
    • Stabilize: Short-term funding for projects with realistic plans to survive the COVID-19 pandemic. Applications demonstrating how these funds will contribute towards a broader financial resilience strategy will be prioritized.
  • The decision panel will be myself and two staff members from our Partnership Development and Strategic Programs team. Applications will be reviewed by this group on a weekly basis. We’d like to move quickly on the initial grants so the first review meeting will be on April 28 (still TBC).
  • These funds will not be subject to any overhead allocations when they are received by projects. You will receive the full $3k or $5k. Core support costs have already been allocated at the source to cover the cost of the work, and Tides Canada has also made a contribution to the fund to keep this as low as possible

• Mental Health Resources – Many projects have expressed a desire for some resources related to mental health for you and your teams. You can now find some links to resources, toolkits, articles and more on the Resources page of the COVID-19 Manual. If there’s anything else you’d like to see on this page, please let me know.

Thanks everyone, and Happy Earth Day for Wednesday!

Lizzie