There are 86,000 charities in Canada. They all need to have exclusively legal objects or purposes. This course will discuss the importance of objects for a registered charity and will be particularly relevant in three circumstances:
- When you are a non-profit and applying to become a registered charity.
- When running a registered charity – awareness of your legal objects and that your charitable activities must be within your objects.
- When making changes to your objects as an existing registered charity and obtaining CRA approval (Many groups in Canada will be making corporate changes and changing objects may be part of that change.)
The topics covered in the course include:
- Charity Law Basics
- Legal Objects/Purposes
- 4 Heads of Charity (relief of poverty, advancement of education, advancement of religion, other purposes beneficial to the community that the law considers charitable)
- Drafting Purposes
- Public Benefit
- CRA Guidances and Policies About Applying for Registered Charity Status
- Objects and Charity Applications
- Changes to objects when already registered charity
- Statement of Activities
This course is geared towards the complexity of registered charities and their objects. It does not deal with the objects of non-profits that are not registered charities.
This course may be of interest to:
- Staff and volunteers of registered charities as the charitable objects that an organization has can constrain the charitable activities that the organization conducts as well as the scope of fundraising, business activities and political activities (PPDDAs) as these generally will be related in one way or another to the objects.
- Board members of a charity are responsible for oversight of the work of a charity, and charities cannot conduct charitable activities outside of their objects.
- Professional advisors who assist charities may find this course helpful in understanding how legal objects affect their clients.
Your Instructor
Mark Blumberg is a lawyer at the law firm Blumbergs Professional Corporation (Blumbergs) in Toronto and works almost exclusively advising non-profits and registered charities on their work in Canada and abroad. Mark has written numerous articles, is a frequent speaker on legal issues involving charity and not-for-profit law. He is the editor of a blog, www.CanadianCharityLaw.ca, and created the largest portal of data on the Canadian charity sector, www.CharityData.ca Mark also edits www.SmartGiving.ca, which provides information on due diligence when selecting charities.
Mark is particularly interested in the regulation of non-profits and charities in Canada, philanthropy, transparency requirements for the voluntary sector, providing accessible information on regulatory issues, and the use of data to make more informed decisions on the charity sector.
Mark is quoted regularly in print media and frequently appears on radio and television on topics relating to philanthropy and the regulation of charities in Canada. Mark has also appeared on a number of occasions in front of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance on topics such as charity regulation, transparency, accountability and tax incentives for philanthropy. Mark has testified at the Special Senate Committee on the Charitable Sector, the Standing Senate Committee on National Finance and the House Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics.
Mark has also made presentations to the Charities Directorate Annual All Staff Meeting as well the Annual Divisional Staff Meeting of the Determinations Section of Charities Directorate. Mark presented to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) when the FATF conducted an evaluation of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism in Canada in 2015.
Mark sat for 4 years on the Charities Directorate Technical Issues Working Group, which is a bi-annual meeting between the Charities Directorate, the Department of Finance and the charity sector to discuss technical and policy issues pertaining to registered charities and the Income Tax Act (Canada). Mark is a member of the Exempt Organizations Committee of the American Bar Association. Mark spent 6 years on the Advisory Committee for the Master of Philanthropy and Nonprofit Leadership (MPNL) at Carleton University. Mark is on the Board of the Canadian Charity Law Association.
Mark has co-authored 20 Questions Directors of Not-for-Profit Organizations Should Ask About Mergers (Published by CPA Canada) and co-wrote a chapter on International Trends in Government-Nonprofit Relations: Constancy, Change, and Contradictions in Non-profits and Government: Collaboration and Conflict in Non-profits and government: collaboration and conflict (Edited by Elizabeth T Boris and C Eugene Steuerle)
Mark frequently lectures to various industry and professional groups on charity compliance issues including the Chartered Professional Accountants Canada (CPA Canada), as well as CPA Ontario, BC and Alberta, the Canadian Bar Association, Ontario Bar Association, Canadian Association of Gift Planners, Association of Fundraising Professionals, Ontario Hospital Association, Ontario Non-profit Network, and many other organizations.
Mark has a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Toronto, an LLB from the University of British Columbia and an LLM from Osgoode Hall Law School in Tax Law.