(June 19, 2020) On April 21, 2020, the federal government announced a $350 million investment, the Emergency Community Support Fund (ECSF) to “improve the ability of community organizations to serve vulnerable Canadians during the COVID-19 crisis.”
It said the funding would flow through three intermediary organizations—United Way Centraide, the Canadian Red Cross and Community Foundations of Canada—who have “the ability to get funds quickly to community organizations that serve vulnerable populations.”
On May 19, 2020, a portal was opened to receive applications for ECSF funding.
One month later on June 16th, Community Foundations of Canada (CFC) released the first information on how the process is going. The CFC says it is “administering a small part of the overall $350M made available by the Government of Canada” and has provided a downloadable CSV file on the projects receiving funding.
So far, the community foundations participating in the ECSF funding portal have received 7,122 proposals worth $108.4 million and have made 1,224 grants worth about $33 million.
Grant amounts range from $750 to %75,000, according the areas in the table below:
Community Foundations of Canada notes that the above breakdown only includes data related to applications submitted through the CFC national application portal. It does not include results for the other ECSF national intermediaries—the Canadian Red Cross and United Way Centraide. It also notes the chart shows “only the primary group served by the projects funded. Many projects are intersectional and may be serving multiple groups listed.”
Neither Canadian Red Cross nor United Way Centraide has yet reported on how they are spending their portions of the $350 million fund.
The ECSF fund is still accepting applications. For more information, Community Foundations of Canada ECSF portal orFAQs.
Feature Photo: Nathan Dumlao
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