By Roy L Hales
The Cortes Island Foundation obtained charitable status on June 28. It's been the goal since the organization was incorporated as a BC Society in 2017.
The first real push came with the Rainbow Ridge project in 2018.
Without charitable status at the time, the foundation had to partner with the Cortes Island Senior’s Society (CISS) to raise the funds needed to purchase the 51 acre parcel in 2018 now known as Rainbow Ridge.
Mark Spevakow, vice president and treasurer of the Cortes Island Foundation. Photo courtesy of Mark SpevaKow.
“There wasn’t a vehicle set up that funds could be put into with charitable status. So that’s when a partnership with the Senior’s Society was set up, because they were a full charity. If funds were donated to them, a tax receipt could be issued. Rainbow Ridge moved down the road that way,” explained Vice President/Treasurer Mark Spevakow.
The Cortes Island Foundation’s role on the project ended when the Cortes Community Housing was formed, according to Spevakow.
“A regular charity has one main focus: dealing, for example, with hunger, education or the lake — their whole reason to be is usually one specific cause. It can be a broad cause, but it is one specific cause. Community foundations are the exact opposite. We cannot focus on one cause, we have to focus on the entire community in general,” he said.
He used the analogy of a wheel: community foundations are the hub, which channels funding, assistance and personal help to the charities around it.
After the Rainbow Ridge push, there was a call to action by the Cortes Island Foundation. Some of the original members returned and new recruits, like Spevakow, joined them in an effort to seek charitable status once again.
They were in the midst of this process when COVID-19 slowed everything down, but the members persisted and finally obtained official status last week.
“When other opportunities come down the road, we will have the right vehicle in place," Spevakow added.
Stones set in log. Photo courtesy of the Cortes Island Foundation.
The Cortes Foundation recently purchased a grants database, that enables all of the island’s other charities to locate information about funders throughout Canada.
They have also provided funding for microgrants on the island and enabled the Cortes Island Women’s Centre to purchase computers.
Now that they have charitable status, Spevakow says the foundation wants to move to the next level.
“The Cortes Island Foundation wants to be a place that bequests can be left to. There is a sense of comfort, that money can be left to the entire island community,” he explained. “Someone can leave a bequest to the community as a whole and that was not an option before.”
The foundation can also build on its current governance and committees.
Moon Snail from Cortes Island. Photo courtesy of the Cortes Island Foundation.