Hi Project Directors,

 My weekly Monday email is coming to you a day late this week. I do have a good reason for my tardiness – I was holding on for confirmation of some very good news to share with you about the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy. Please see below for more information, and some additional updates about the Rapid Response Fund and Temporary Wage subsidy allocations, and a financial management resource.

• Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy – Once year-end transactions were finalized, our fantastically persistent Director of Finance went back to look at TCI revenue in many different ways to make double sure that the numbers didn’t line up for CEWS…and I’m very glad she did. I am delighted to confirm that after significant analysis Tides Canada Initiatives is eligible for the CEWS payroll subsidy for March AND April reporting periods! This means that projects will receive funding equivalent to 75% of their payroll (up to max $847 per employee per week) for March 15 – May 9, 2020.
  • As of now we only meet requirements for the March reporting period, however entities who qualify for one period automatically qualify for the next regardless of revenue. So now we qualify for March and April together. We’ll have to run the numbers again in early June for the May period and re-apply if we’re eligible.
  • The People & Culture team are working hard to calculate the subsidies now based on the eligibility criteria. They will reach out to Project Directors directly if they have any questions/information about your project, for example claiming employer contributions on any furloughed employees, options to rehire employees, or what to do if you have employees claiming the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit for any part of the reporting period.
  • We expect to receive the funds in about 2-3 weeks, and they will then be coded to projects. I’ll provide an update once we’ve submitted the application about what to expect.
  • Finally, this is unrestricted funding that is intended to subsidize payroll. Your Finance Lead and Project Specialist will work with you to discuss how to best use/report these funds in alignment with any active grants.

• The Rapid Response Fund for Changemakers decision committee met on Wednesday to award the first two grants to projects. I’m delighted to share that the recipients are:
  • Summerlunch+ - $5,000 - The summerlunch+ team is coming together to address an immediate food insecurity issue with our largest partner, The Neighbourhood Organization.  They have had requests from over 600 families in low-income areas who need urgent support for food. The Neighbourhood Organization has funding for very basic food boxes consisting of shelf-stable pantry items, and summerlunch+ will supplement their basics with fresh fruit and vegetables. They will also partner with Second Harvest, which sources ‘rescued’ food for families. Many of these fresh foods may be unfamiliar, so summerlunch+ will provide recipes  to avoid waste and get healthy food to hungry families.
  • Not Far From The Tree - $5,000 - Not Far From the Tree plans to proceed with the picking season to get fresh fruit to 35 social service agency partners who are experiencing record high levels of demand for food. To do so safely, they need to invest in sanitization equipment, including masks, gloves, cleaning products and clean, fresh re-usable bags to donate the fruit. Normally these are donated by volunteers, but they can't organize a bag drive safely this season. Not Far From The Tree will also hire additional seasonal staff to support the increased care and sanitization of equipment sets spread throughout Toronto. Finally, they are mobilizing immediately to purchase and give away ~40 fruit trees (specifically elderberries and serviceberries) to vulnerable communities such as Thorncliffe Park, that can benefit from having access to local, resilient food systems in their community.
  • Congratulations to both of the recipients! I’m so pleased we can support the important work that you’re doing. Fundraising for the Rapid Response Fund continues, and I encourage projects to keep applying. You can find more information about the Rapid Response Fund, including the application form, in the COVID-19 manual here.

• In addition to the Rapid Response Fund, TCI was also able to support seven Shared Platform projects this week (including other Rapid Response Fund applicants) through the Federal Government Temporary Wage Subsidy. Each of these projects received $3k-5k (based on need) to contribute to avoiding layoffs.

• The Ontario Nonprofit Network is hosting a free webinar on “scenario planning and cash flow management in uncertain times” on May 27 at 11am PST/2pm ET. The webinar will share tips and tools to help your nonprofit improve scenario planning and cash flow management during the COVID-19 pandemic. Plus, all participants will receive a free scenario planning excel sheet to help your team get started. You can find out more and register here.

That’s a lot of information for one weekly email. If you have question about the Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy please reach out to the People & Culture team. Very much looking forward to sharing future updates for you all.

Happy #GivingTuesday everyone!

Lizzie