As a result of our Call for Nominations process, we are pleased to welcome Wilda Wallace from Prairie Branches Enterprises Inc. (Wilkie) as North Region Associate Board Representative to the SARC Board of Directors.
We are also very happy to welcome back Donald Salie from Battlefords Trade & Education Centre Inc. (North Battleford) for another term in the position of North West Region Regular Board Representative. Their terms will begin on June 23, 2023 in line with SARC’s AGM. We look forward to another exciting year ahead with new and familiar faces!
On March 8, members from the SARC Board that sit on this committee met in Regina. This long-standing committee is made up of members from the SARC Board and leadership team as well as members from the leadership team within CLSD. Strategic development work continued that will support three previously identified priority areas within fostering person-centred cultures. The development of workplans is underway and the next Provincial Partnership meeting will be held in June (date still to be confirmed).
While the Executive Committee of the SARC Board has overall responsibility for advocacy, a number of SARC Board Members actively participate on the Advocacy Committee. This adhoc committee was struck in 2021 and consists of a diverse group of representatives
from a number of SARC Member Organizations, six SARC Board Members, and four SARC employees. This group has worked very hard over the last number of months and has been instrumental in helping to develop the Disability Service sector promotional campaign (launching soon!), testing tools, sharing information, determining next steps, and acting as sector ambassadors in their communities, networks, and at the MLA Reception held on May 2 (refer to Collective Voice article for more information). During this period, members of the SARC Board also took part in a number of in-person and virtual meetings with MLAs.
Every Spring, SARC hosts four meetings in four communities throughout the province with its Members. Meetings are typically attended by Member organization Executive Directors and/or other senior staff and some Board Members. These meetings prove to be a great opportunity for all that attend to network with colleagues and share resources, ideas, updates, innovation, and perspectives with people working or governing within the Disability Service sector. SARC Board Members once again reported how much they enjoyed speaking to other Members’ Board Members at these meetings in April. SARC was also encouraged to see how many new and existing Board Members from Member organizations attended.
In January’s issue of The Table, we stated that SARC would be engaging our Members in ‘next steps’ discussions at April’s regional Member Update meetings. The release of the Provincial Budget in March brings the previous cycle of advocacy to a close and prompts the discussion of whether success was achieved and what, if anything, should be done next to advocate for improved funding in the Disability Service sector. Most notable to our advocacy strategy in the 2023-2024 budget was the announcement of an additional $7.7 million for service providers supporting people experiencing disability (we have sought confirmation as to percentage impact to organizations’ budgets, but we have not yet received it).
At the April meetings, we asked Members to tell us how they felt about the Provincial Budget, give us a sense of the current state of their workforce, and share their thoughts on what should come next for the sector’s advocacy strategy. All SARC Members will receive consolidated notes from all four meetings, but here is a summary of what we heard from Members there:
• Organizations are appreciative of any increase, but this was not enough, particularly considering the wage gap and total compensation inequities that already exist between our sector and Health (the Disability Service sector’s greatest workforce competitor) and the rate of inflation/cost of living.
• The increase does not address true costs for employee benefits packages or the rising costs for mandatory employer related costs (ex. WCB).
• The Disability Service sector and the people supported continue to be undervalued.
• Employees are working multiple jobs, often completing back-to-back shifts, to make ends meet, which is giving rise to safety risks (ex. fatigue, medication errors, etc.).
• Many organizations reported that they have been forced to lower their hiring standards, just to ensure shifts are filled, which places people being supported at great risk.
• The complexity of the work continues to increase. Organizations are
supporting more and more people with complex behavioural, physical, and mental health needs as well as addictions. Ancillary health, harm reduction, community, and other support services are often unavailable to people supported in the Disability Service sector.
• An unstable and unhealthy workforce has a direct negative impact on quality of service, community inclusion, and person-centredness.
• Many CBOs reported seeing a significant rise in crisis and harmful behaviours in the people they support due to the effects of workforce instability.
• Turnover remains high for most organizations; employees are leaving after receiving training.
• Vacancies are on the rise and remaining vacant for longer.
• Overtime costs required in order to cover vacant shifts are considerably higher than past years.
• More and more middle and senior leaders are off on stress/medical leaves or leaving for higher paying/less stressful jobs.
• The work the sector does is an essential service, yet the funding philosophy and funding structure doesn’t reflect the critical and complex nature of the work.
• The strategy has been pretty ‘safe’ up to this point, but we’re not getting the results needed.
• There are varying levels of comfort when it comes to engaging people supported, their families, and employees, but we are seeing more and more employees, people being supported, families, and friends uniting and standing up to say, “People experiencing disabilities deserve better.” The sector needs their involvement to amplify the messages.
• As a Membership, organizations need to continue to care about their peer organizations, network more on the advocacy front, and support each other to take action. We need to demand that all people experiencing disability, regardless of the community they live in, are supported by skilled, qualified, person-centred professionals and that the CBOs that employ them have the capacity to deliver the highest quality services and meet the needs of all people.
SARC then met with the Advocacy Committee (comprised of SARC Members and Board Directors) on May 2 to share this feedback and begin to discuss next steps. These discussions will inform the next strategy and related supporting materials for Members moving forward. Stay tuned for the release of this year’s Member Advocacy Toolkit in July.
That same day, SARC and the Advocacy Committee hosted an MLA Reception at the Legislative Building. SARC has been on the waitlist for this opportunity
for over a year, which is set up as a come and go opportunity for MLAs either in between their committee meetings or at the end of their day. With MLAs already in the building, the event’s convenient format is intended to draw a larger crowd versus holding something off-site. One drawback to this format, however, is the limited room capacity; therefore, SARC was not able to open up this event to all SARC Members as we’ve done with past MLA events.
The premise of the MLA Reception was to have MLAs drawn to six large pictures on display throughout the room, depicting the value of services that SARC Members provide, the impact on people experiencing disability and communities, and the challenges that SARC Members are facing with employee recruitment and retention. These types of events are not meant for ‘hard hitting’ lobbying; rather, they provide opportunity for raising the profile of the sector and awareness of funding realities.
We were very pleased to have 34 MLAs join us for the event, and we would like to extend a big thank you to the Advocacy Committee representatives who were able to join us that day for the wonderful job they did engaging them and increasing awareness. We are working on plans to follow up with those attending MLAs and were happy with the overall timing of the event leading into Disability Service Professionals Week, May 22-26, 2023 and our next cycle of Member advocacy activities beginning through the summer.
Meanwhile, our discussions within the Ministry of Social Services continue. SARC met with Joel Kilbride, the new Assistant Deputy Minister for Disability Programs, on May 11 to bring him up to speed on the current landscape of the Disability Service sector and our Members’ urgent funding needs. Joel has been with the Ministry’s Child & Family Programs division for several years, but prior to that he was a Director within Disability Programs, so he already has good familiarity with the sector and we are looking forward to working with him again.
While funding for employee compensation and benefits continues to be a high priority for the sector, it is not the only area of advocacy that SARC is working on. SARC’s Advocacy and Lobbying Framework, which was established from
the survey feedback from our Members in spring 2021, identifies three other priorities alongside Compensation. At our regional Member Update meetings, we provided updates on these as well.
As we continue to hear from our Members that many areas of their non-salary operating budget are not funded adequately, we have been discussing various ways to clearly show these deficits to government. SARC had developed an Excel spreadsheet tool in an attempt to compare actual costs to funding provided for each area of the CLSD Funding Standards Guide. Representatives from the Advocacy Committee volunteered to test the tool for us in terms of how easy it would be to supply the required information. Initially, the plan was to issue this tool to Members in May.
After receiving the data from the test group, SARC reviewed all comments, suggestions, and results to determine whether the tool had adequately gathered the information needed. This testing phase showed the complexities and various ways that organizations may not be able to supply the precise information requested. Additionally, we recognized the amount of time and effort it would take for organizations to complete and submit this tool to SARC, particularly at a time of year when organizations are quite busy with responsibilities related to their year-end, audit, and AGM.
As such, the Advocacy Committee plans to reconvene to discuss alternate methods of obtaining Member data on non-salary funding, and we will continue to advocate for an independent review regarding the adequacy of current levels of funding.
SARC has continued working on the development of a public relations campaign to profile the value and importance of the Disability Service sector. In the last issue of The Table, we shared that we were awaiting our first look at possible creative materials developed by our contracted firm, Brown Communications. Upon receiving those creative concepts, we sought feedback from the Advocacy Committee while Brown Communications undertook market testing with a test group of 400 Saskatchewan residents. Through this, we were looking for feedback on what people liked, what they didn’t like, and what their key takeaways were from our messaging. Based on all of this feedback, we finalized the
concept, and Brown Communications is currently supplying creative to media outlets as per our media plan.
The campaign, called “Start With Hello”, is set to launch May 22. As the campaign progresses, you will see some advertising that is more general in nature as to the value of the Disability Service sector and then others with more targeted messaging to encourage people to consider a career in the sector.
While we’ll certainly have a good amount of paid media running throughout the life of the campaign (through to August 2024), we can also amplify our message organically with the help of our Members – examples include liking and sharing SARC’s social media posts as well as incorporating creative material from the campaign on your website or other promotional materials. The more public presence our messaging has the stronger the impact will be in terms of raising awareness about the essential nature of the Disability Service sector. We will have a webpage dedicated to housing creative material that our Members can use, so stay tuned for more details.
Educational Standards for the Disability Service Sector: Initiatives pertaining to compensation, non-salary funding standards, and sector promotion are currently underway, whereas work to establish educational standards for the sector are a bit further out on the horizon. This initiative is important, however, as our sector continues to come up against the fact that there are set educational standards for the Continuing Care Assistant position within the Health sector, which we are comparing our sector’s Direct Support Professional position to. While we know the Health sector has relaxed their pre-qualification requirements in light of their own challenges with recruitment (providing opportunities to ‘earn as you learn’), the fact remains that there is a stated standard that does not exist for
the Disability Service sector.
The Advocacy and Lobbying Framework set out the following goals:
• By April 1, 2025, the Disability Service sector has come to a general agreement around minimum educational standards for CBOs’ core positions funded by the Ministry of Social Services (including grandfathering considerations).
• By April 1, 2027, educational standards are formally defined within job descriptions, collective agreements, quality assurance and/or Saskatchewan Basic Standards documents, Agreements for Service with the Ministry of Social Services, etc., and that the Ministry’s salary funding standards reflect the educational standards.
We plan to begin discussions with the SARC Membership on educational standards in 2024.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Amy McNeil, Executive Director, at (306) 933-0616, ext. 229 or amcneil@sarcan.sk.ca, or Melanie Weiss, Director of Member Services/AED, at (306) 933-0616, ext. 245 or mweiss@sarcan.sk.ca.
May 22 - 26, 2023
The Government of Saskatchewan has proclaimed May 22 to 26, 2023 as “Disability Service Professionals Week” (DSP Week) in Saskatchewan.
DSP Week is meant to recognize the dedication of service providers who work to ensure that people experiencing disability are valued, supported, and included members of their communities.
SARC will be celebrating DSP Week throughout the week on our social media and at our Spring Conference with hundreds of our sector’s amazing professionals on May 24-25. We encourage all Members to join in on the celebrations in their communities!
by Desiree Tirk
Nonprofit boards of directors are accountable to ensure the organization has the necessary resources to achieve its mission. As a director, you are also responsible to ensure that sufficient funding is secured so that the business of the organization can be carried out. While some nonprofit organizations diversify their funding sources of income by seeking out sponsorships, grants, foundations, fundraising, or starting a social enterprise, to name a few, others may rely on just one or two funding sources.
Together, the executive director and board should regularly and proactively evaluate revenue sources by asking: ‘What would happen if our organization lost our largest source of revenue? How heavily do we rely on any one source of funding? What are some potential opportunities to diversify our revenue stream?’
Nonprofits can benefit from diversifying their funding by creating security and deeper financial stability, increasing flexibility in the type of programs and services they offer, enhancing the organization’s
reputation and credibility in the eyes of potential funders, and enabling organizations to be able to pursue strategic growth opportunities as they come available. According to NonProfit Quarterly, “Revenue diversification can give you options when the ground shifts beneath you.”
If your organization is seeking out additional revenue sources, there are some things to consider:
• Revenue diversification takes time
– grant writing, fundraising, and developing sponsorship packages all take time, not to mention fulfilling additional accounting and reporting requirements. Does your organization’s staff have the time and capacity for this? If not, consider seeking out committee or board members who may have experience in fundraising, sponsorships, or setting up major gift programs. Or, utilize available resources such as Grant Writing
101_PCD (prairiecentral.ca), Grant Writing 101 Video Series - YouTube, or this free webinar on prospect research for nonprofits.
• If you’re planning to fundraise,
develop a well-diversified fundraising plan – Check out this free tool that you can use to forecast your fundraising efforts. Consider multiple methods and strategies such as Crowdfunding, virtual fundraisers, social media fundraising or LinkedIn Fundraising. Get Fully Funded suggests it is important to “choose the fundraising strategy that will give you the best return on your investment of time, money, and energy” and provides a downloadable one-page quick and simple fundraising plan to create a successful fundraising plan. As a board director, your role as an ambassador, connector, and storyteller can help with fundraising and engaging donors.
• Planning is important – most grant application dates happen early spring (February, March, April) or fall (September, October, November), and programs generally need to be ready to start shortly after the approval process. Having a plan in place will ensure your organization is successful in working towards its mission.
• Alignment of priorities – consider how your funding request aligns with the specific priorities of the funder. For example, if ‘collaboration, learning, and innovation’ are the funder’s priority areas, have you described how your funding request fits within these areas? According to Grantwatch. com, “Submitting a proposal only made up of text copied and pasted
from other proposals is unlikely to be successful.”
• Avoid Fund-Chasing – just because money is available doesn’t mean that an organization should apply for it, especially if it means drifting away from your mission. If the funding aligns with your organization’s mission and goals, then go for it.
• Communicate your success – Be sure to communicate with your community, those sponsors, donors, and granters that have helped contribute to your success. “An organization can be doing great work, but in most cases, it needs to be sharing its progress, its programs and services, and its discoveries with the public to remain relevant.” (SaskCulture, 2023)
• Consider applying for grants and sponsorships to reach your financial goals: there are a number of funding opportunities available throughout the year:
» Saskatchewan Parks and Recreation Association’s Grants and Funding Guide.
» SaskCulture’s Find a Grant.
» Imagine Canada’s Grant Connect.
» There are seven Sport, Culture and Recreation Districts in Saskatchewan that each provide funding and resources.
» Municipal grants (i.e. search City of Saskatoon, Regina, Prince
Albert, Yorkton).
» Community Foundations: South Saskatchewan Community Foundation or find your area on the map of Community Foundations of Canada.
» Financial Institutions: Affinity Credit Union, TD Bank, CIBC, Scotiabank, RBC, and BMO.
» Corporations such as Sask Energy, SaskTel, SaskPower, Google, or BATC Community Development Corporation.
» Local businesses in or near your community such as Co-op, Giant Tiger, or Walmart. Consider where you shop, buy groceries, or places you visit regularly.
» Community Initiatives Fund (CIF) Welcome to the Community Initiatives Fund! » Community Initiatives Fund (cifsask.org).
» Other Nonprofit Organizations such as SIGA.
the past 25 years working in community development in the nonprofit and government sectors, Desiree brings a variety of experience with developing and facilitating workshops and has held positions as Program Manager, Facilitator, and Trainer. Desiree has over 20 years’ experience as co-owner of a business and holds a Bachelor of Indian Social Work and Bachelor of Arts in Native Studies.
As outlined in The Complete Guide to Diversifying Your Nonprofit Revenue Streams, what is most important if you’re considering revenue diversification is to “create a plan that’s right for your organization and will help you increase revenue in the long term.”
For more information on revenue diversification, visit ELEVATE or the Fundraising section in Board Resources on SARC Learning Central.
To connect with Desiree Tirk and learn more about how strategic planning can help your organization, email her at dtirk@sarcan.sk.ca
SARC’s online leadership and professional development program, ELEVATE, is a userfriendly program specifically for boards of directors and executive directors in the nonprofit sector. A modular-based program that can be accessed at your convenience, ELEVATE is an excellent opportunity to supplement your knowledge of governance best practices and the various roles and responsibilities of board directors.
ELEVATE is a leadership and professional development opportunity for nonprofit board directors that will support you in your role of leading and governing an organization and will help your organization to maintain a standard of excellence in the nonprofit sector by:
• Showing leadership related to your commitment to governance best practices.
• Increasing organizational capability and sustainability with knowledgeable leaders governing the organization.
• Ensuring your board is following best practices in order to meet expectations of accountability and responsibility standards.
• Recruiting new board directors. Individuals will be more inclined to get involved with your organization if you are able to demonstrate how they will be supported and be provided with professional development opportunities.
Throughout ELEVATE, you’ll be provided with a wealth of resources ranging from sample policies and templates to helpful checklists. These resources can be referenced as often as needed and can be customized to fit your organization’s specific needs.
By signing up for ELEVATE, you receive a one-year subscription to the program, so you can go back and reference the modules at any time.
