Canadian Charity Law

Here are some statistics from the CRA dealing with the 83,000 registered charities in Canada as of the end of 2007.

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The CRA has recently posted a useful checklist entitled “Goods and services tax/harmonized sales tax (GST/HST) checklist for charities”

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The Charities Directorate has vastly improved its section of the CRA website over the last year, although it still has a way to go!.  In the past they have improved the quality and accessibility of information placed on the site.  CRA has recently improved the ability of Canadians to search their database of charities as we discuss in more detail.  If you have not viewed the Charity Directorates website recently it is well worth visiting.

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Here is the December edition of the Blumbergs Canadian charity law e-mail list.  If you wish to receive a copy of the Blumbergs Canadian Charity Law List then please sign up at the Blumbergs’ Newsletter Page.  It takes about 10 seconds and it is free.  The Blumbergs Canadian Charity Law List is sent every month or two and it has the latest information for Canadian non-profits and charities on legal and ethical issues. Comments are always appreciated.

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This entry discusses whether social enterprise, social innovation, social financing or community economic development (CED) is charitable.

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Charities do a lot of great work.  But with over 85,000 of them, and a few hundred bad apples amongst the lot, there will be times that you will be disappointed in a charity.  When you have a concern about a charity or a charity does something wrong here are some ideas about how you can complain.

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Here is a copy of my presentation Global Philanthropy: Canadians and Canadian Charities and Foreign Activities that I delivered to the Estate Planning Council of Toronto.

The problem of abusive charitable tax shelters using the developing world as a marketing tool continues.  It just goes to show the importance of dealing with credible and legitimate charities if you want to make the world a better place.

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The CRA has reminded charitable organizations (not foundations) that these charitable organizations will beginning in 2009 have to in addition to other disbursement quota requirements need to spend 3.5% of the value of all of their property the charity has that is not used directly in charitable activities or administration.

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This brief article discusses the Charitable Goods Policy of the Canada Revenue Agency.

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This FAQ looks at whether there are residency requirements for Canadian charities.

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Here is my updated article on “How Much Should A Canadian Charity Spend on Overhead

This note discusses why low overhead may not be a good thing for a charity and what is appropriate.

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Canadian registered charities need to scrupulously avoid involvement with partisan political activity.  In this brief note we cover CRA policy statement CPS-022 on political activity by charities and CRA’s Advisory on Partisan Political Activities. It is really important for Canadian charities to understand the policy statement and advisory for two reasons: 1) failure to do so can result in a charity losing its charitable status; and 2) many charities can in fact do more allowable political activities than they currently do but they misunderstand CRA’s views on this important topic and they think that CRA disapproves of all “political” activity, which is clearly not the case. Full Article in PDF

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Here is a copy of a powerpoint presentation Blumbergs recently delivered to a US 501(c)(3) on Fundraising and Grantmaking from Canada

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This case dealt with whether the Charities Directorate of CRA requires judicial authorization to request certain information from a registered charity and CRA won the appeal.  The CRA note headnote/summary is below.

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It looks like Industry Canada will be making a second attempt to pass a new federal non-profits act to replace the Canada Corporations Act.  It will be called the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act (NFPC).

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The Canada Revenue Agency has recently been sending out a new form letter to some applicants for charitable registration which appear to have foreign activities requesting they provide greater detail in terms of the foreign activities.  Here is a copy of a sample letter from CRA.  The letter is worth reading and I would emphasize the importance of providing sufficient detail of the proposed foreign activity as well as a draft agreement for any structured arrangements.

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The law firm of Scarfone Hawkins LLP in Hamilton has recently brought a class action lawsuit against a number of parties for their involvement with the Banyan Tree Foundation including the law firm of Fraser Milner Casgrain.  It will be interesting to see how this case turns out.  I predict that there will be other cases against other law firms that have been involved with preparing opinion letters for transactions that CRA considers to be “shams”.  The allegations in the statement of claim have yet to be proved in court.

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