In this decision, Ms. Sowah appealed the Minister of National Revenue’s assessment of her 2006 taxation year in which her charitable donation claim was denied. The court found that the charitable receipts issued by the charity did not contain all…
In this decision, a taxpayer appealed the Minister of National Revenue’s denial of his claim for a charitable donation in 2009. The amount he claimed represented his estimate of the fair market value of the use by a registered charity…
The Humanitarian Coalition has launched an appeal for Typhoon Haiyan which has killed many people in the Philippines and left many homeless. “The Humanitarian Coalition is a joint appeal mechanism. It is comprised of CARE Canada, Oxfam Canada, Oxfam-Québec, Plan…
The Ontario Government has passed “Bill 36 – An Act to enact the Local Food Act, 2013 and to amend the Taxation Act, 2007 to provide for a tax credit to farmers for donating certain agricultural products that they have…
Saskatchewan has introduced a bill that would regulate informal public appeals. This will cover situations like when a fire destroys a family home and funds are raised to help the family and what to do if there are excess funds…
We recently reviewed the T3010 Registered Charity Information Return database for 2011 as part of the Sean Blumberg Transparency Project. We provided an overview of the whole charity sector in the Blumbergs’ Charity Sector Snapshot 2011. We have taken a…
The Finance Committee of the House of Commons has been holding hearings. A number of charities have presented. Many charities have sent in submissions. Here is a link to the Minutes of Proceedings: http://www.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocId=6292712&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=41&Ses=2 “MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS Meeting No.…
The Accounting Standards Board and Public Sector Accounting Board are asking for comments by December 15, 2013 on some changes to the principles affecting non-profit accounting. The document is entitled “Improvements to Not-for-Profit Standards (Applicable to Private and Public Sector…
The Muttart Foundation has released the 2013 edition of its “Talking About Charities”. It updates its last similar opinion poll from 5 years ago. Here is a link to the various responses and reports: Here is the summary: …
At the website of the Toronto class action law firm Paliare Roland they have a note that “On Friday, October 18, 2013, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice approved the settlements with the Law Firm Defendants (including Edwin C. Harris…
Peter Braid on October 23, 2013 withdrew his bill entitled “An Act respecting a National Charities Week and to amend the Income Tax Act (charitable and other gifts)”. We welcome the withdrawal of the private members’ bill as we, and…
Here is an interesting series of letters from CRA to the Corban Foundation in the 1990s relating its revocation as a registered charity. It deals with the meaning of a gift, and various programs to provide tuition assistance to those…
I enjoyed giving a presentation tonight to an MBA class at Schulich School of Business at York University on Structures for Social Enterprise. Great students and lots of questions. Here is a copy of my presentation Structures for Social Enterprise.
I am looking at a number of old audit letters from CRA. In one of the audit letters it discusses the CRA’s views on director compensation. We have previously discussed this issue on our blog. Here are some paragraphs from…
Occasionally a Canadian registered charity will want to change its fiscal year end. Sometimes it is because you want to align with another charity or funder. Sometimes you just find that there are better or worse times to be involved…
There was a very nice article in the Vancouver Sun on Kevin McCort, the new CEO of the Vancouver Foundation. The Vancouver Foundation is the largest of the community foundations in Canada. Here is the text of the article: …
So far the CRA 2013 database has about 7900 charities on it. There are in total approximately 86,000 Canadian charities who will file their T3010s. Therefore, less than 10% of the 2013 T3010 forms have been filed and inputted into…
I had the privilege of presenting a presentation today on Compliance Issues with Successfully Funding Aboriginal Groups for The Circle of Philanthropy and Aboriginal Peoples in Canada’s All My Relations Gathering in Toronto. Here is a copy of my plenary…
Here is a presentation that I delivered to the Canada Southern Africa Chamber of Business’ 11th Risk Mitigation and & CSR Seminar entitled Canadian Charities and CSR in the New DFATD World Here are some of the other presentations: http://www.canadasachamber.com/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=NewsDetail&newsid=230
It looks like the new Ontario Not-for-Profit Corporations Act, 2010 (“ONCA”) will not come into force until July 2014 or perhaps in 2015. If one is considering establishing a new charity today and you are based in Ontario we would…
Here is an updated from Blumbergs Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act (CNCA) Suitcase . The Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act (CNCA) came into force on October 17, 2011. Organizations now have less than one year to continue to the new act or…
In the ongoing case of Lipson v. Cassels Brock & Blackwell there has been a cost award in the certification motion. The Ontario Court of Appeal had earlier heard an appeal of Mr. Justice Perell’s decision in the certification motion…
The CRA has added a number of new webinars to their websites on arts, CED, the T3010 and political activities. The following recorded webinars are now available on the CRA’s video gallery: ?Arts activities and charitable registration ?Community economic…
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