The NWACFund: Building Resilience to Unpredictable Government Funding

NWAC’s Legal Unit is helping to establish and organize a new charity that will facilitate independent and sustainable financing of projects that contribute to NWAC’s work and objectives.

Like all other national Indigenous organizations, NWAC is vulnerable to the discretionary funding decisions of the federal government. Whether the organization is able to undertake or continue projects and activities that work toward our purposes and objectives is often determined by the willingness of government departments and agencies to provide the requisite funding.

While NWAC has managed to successfully navigate a tumultuous and unpredictable public funding landscape over the last several fiscals, government funding of Indigenous, gender-focused projects is often impertinent to the relevant issues.

Diversifying away from funding dependency on the federal government will enable NWAC to undertake and continue projects and activities despite government unwillingness to contribute to the initiatives. It is for this reason that we have incorporated the NWACFund and are in the process of applying for its registration as a charitable organization.

The NWACFund, once registered as a charity, will be able to issue charitable tax receipts for donations that will be used to support projects and initiatives that work toward the shared objectives and visions the charity has with NWAC.

Expanding NWAC’s revenue sources through cooperation with the new NWACFund is one component of the organization’s ongoing efforts to mitigate the evolving and dynamic risks to the adequate and sustainable funding of Indigenous gender-focused initiatives across Canada.