Non-profit,
no dough

>> Federal funding cuts kill daycare
for immigrant kids

by PATRICK LEJTENYI

For the past 20 years, the South Asian Women’s Community Centre (SAWCC) has been running a successful summer day camp for the children of recent immigrants to Montreal. But not anymore. Due to federal funding cuts, the SAWCC’s camp is history for at least this summer, and possibly the years to come.

The money, which is provided by the Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC) youth employment program, would have gone, as it has in the past, to hire students to help run the centre’s day camp. The cut has infuriated the centre and left between 30 and 40 kids of South Asian origin without anything to do or anywhere to go over the holidays. What’s more, the cuts came without much in the way of explanation.

“Usually, HRDC never gives us an answer on funding ahead of time,” says SAWCC coordinator Sadeqa Siddiqui. She says SAWCC only receives confirmation of funding, and the amount, about two weeks before the summer camp opens in late June, so when the money wasn’t forthcoming at the beginning of that month, the centre planned to open the camp anyway. She was then surprised to receive an HRDC form letter stating that SAWCC would not be receiving any money because the HRDC budget couldn’t cover it. Siddiqui, however, suspects that there may be other factors involved.

“We are a non-profit organization, so HRDC has to pay the full salary for people who work here,” she says. Unlike private corporations, which pay a part of a student employee’s salary and cover benefits, non-profit organizations are fully covered by the federal government. She thinks HRDC may have just not wanted to fork over the full amount for a summer student. But even that explanation doesn’t make sense to her, because the students are paid minimum wage, which translates into a little more than $2,200 for nine weeks worth of work.

Martin Dupuis, an HRDC program officer in Montreal, says that the federal government does not, in fact, give out grants for youth employment programs anymore, but rather only distributes contributions.
“The difference between a grant and a contribution means that if HRDC gives you a $100,000 grant, you can do whatever you like with it,” he says. “If we give you a $100,000 contribution, it means you need to tell me what you plan to do with it beforehand and report back every month.” Dupuis would not get into specifics about individual applications, but did say that contributions are determined on “an ad hoc basis, based on the proposals given to us.”

Apparently, SAWCC’s proposal wasn’t good enough. “The letter we received also said that our program doesn’t give enough career development experience to students,” Siddiqui says. “But it does contribute to the personal development of a student. They get to work in a community organization, they learn management skills, they learn how to use their discipline. The students who work here are usually high school or CÉGEP students, because the private businesses have hired all the university students anyway. So they are not here to get their careers—they have to go back to school anyway.
“It’s a random decision,” she says. “They cut whoever they want, and give money to whoever they want. I don’t know what criteria HRDC has.” :