In this June 29 email bulletin from the Calgary Chamber of Voluntary Organizations you will find resources and news items for and about the voluntary sector.

CCVO Publications and News

Annual Report available

Our Annual Report is online. We hope it will increase your knowledge about CCVO and the support we can provide you, as well as ways you can get further engaged to strengthen the sector.

Energizing AGM gets people talking; Board of Directors elected

Thank you to everyone who came out to our Annual General Meeting. You can view biographies of our new Board of Directors. Special guest Bob Wyatt gave an energizing speech about the need for the nonprofit sector to unleash its power.

Membership Survey Results lead the June 2007 Newsletter

View our latest newsletter (mailed to members in mid-June). It includes results from our 2007 Membership Survey and updates on government collaborations and policy issues. 

Government News

Have your say on the Community Spirit Program!

We strongly encourage you to fill in the government questionnaire regarding the proposed program to match individual donations. Input is required by July 31. If lack of time is a barrier, we recommend you just answer the questions that matter most to you (you don’t even need to read the workbook). The questionnaire is available online or in print and is open to all Albertans. It’s a great opportunity for staff, volunteers, clients and community members and others to have their say.

Important points for the questionnaire:

• One of CCVO’s main comments is that, while the Community Spirit Fund is a positive form of supplemental funding, it is not an alternative to reasonable levels of government funding to support necessary services/programs. We urge you to include this as general input (in question 7).
• Question 1 asks whether all nonprofits or only registered charities should be eligible for matching funds. If only registered charities are eligible, then 10,000 other nonprofits will be left out, including many smaller, community-based organizations with less capacity to seek other funding sources. To support these smaller organizations, all nonprofits need to be eligible.
• Question 3 asks which types of organizations (arts, social services, etc) should be eligible. If you want your organization type included, be sure to answer.
• It is not clear how long the funding to support the Community Spirit Fund will be in place, or where this funding will come from. Placing a limit on the amount any one organization could receive would help to prevent most of the funds from being used up by only a few large organizations (see question 12).

For more information visit CCVO's webpage on the Community Spirit Fund.

Government spending on social services

A new Statistics Canada analysis reveals that in Alberta, the combined spending on social services by provincial and municipal governments has gone from 15.9% of the total budget in 1989 to just 11.7% of the total budget in 2007. The percentage of federal government spending on social services has also declined.

Building Safe Communities and Reducing Crime

An interim report is now available from Alberta’s Crime Reduction and Safe Communities Task Force. Public stakeholder meetings demonstrated that issues related to drugs and alcohol were by far the greatest concern. You can email responses to the Task Force chair, MLA Heather Forsyth.

Post-Secondary Student Volunteers

Community Service Learning Project for U of C volunteers

Could your organization benefit from a few University of Calgary students undertaking a short term project or other volunteer work? For more information contact Dr. Doug Brent, Faculty of Communication and Culture, at (403) 220-5458

Need Stakeholder Research?

Mount Royal College students in the Research Methods for Public Relations course are available to undertake free client-based surveys (questionnaires). If your target population is relatively small and the fall timeframe works for you, contact Jim Wood at (403) 440-6113.

Database Administration students available

SAIT students are available for your summer or fall projects. They have completed their academics (in areas such as backup/recovery, performance tuning, data warehousing and data mining) and are ready for eight-week paid or unpaid work. Contact Donna deMan at (403) 210-5631.

Staffing and Volunteer News and Resources

Showcase your organization’s human resource policies, procedures and practices

The HR Council for the Voluntary/Nonprofit Sector is updating its Human Resources toolkit. They invite you to showcase human resource policies, procedures and practices. Contact Lee Rose.

Volunteer Calgary is photographing volunteers

If you would your volunteers photographed in action, contact Amanda Derksen at (403) 231-1443.

‘Paint the Town’ Gets a Makeover

Volunteer Calgary has developed a program to assist companies and nonprofits in creating customized volunteer opportunities for employee groups. Contact Laurel Benson at (403) 231-1448.

Online Job Centre

To see job descriptions or to post a job online, visit our popular online job centre

******************************************

Are you a CCVO Member yet?

CCVO is a membership-based organization that works to strengthen the voluntary sector in Calgary and take a leadership role on policy matters affecting the sector as a whole. To learn more about CCVO membership, contact Janet Lavoie at 261-6655 or jlavoie@calgarycvo.org.

Want to Subscribe?

You can stay in the know by signing up for a free CCVO email bulletin approximately every two weeks.

To Unsubscribe From this Email Bulletin:

If you would like to unsubscribe, visit www.calgarycvo.org/eNews_unsub.php

CCVO

STRONG VOICE . STRONG CONNECTIONS .  POSITIVE CHANGE

www.calgarycvo.org