External Grants and Granting Agencies

Local | Provincial | National | Other Directories

The following page contains a series of links to external granting agencies who fund, or have funded, projects and initiatives with a social planning dimension. The City is not affiliated with these agencies. For more information on the nature of the specific grants and funding opportunities, please contact each agency directly.

We’re just a the beginning stages of compiling this list, so please check back as we continue to add resources. If you know of a funder that should be on this list, please let us know. Send an email with the details to social.planning@vancouver.ca.

Local

• BC Technology / Social Venture Partners - BCT provides grants to support organizations working with three critical populations: women at risk, children and youth, and people living in Vancouver’s downtown eastside and inner-city.

• Click to Kids - CLICK is a dynamic fundraising conduit that directs funds to a wide range of programs that enhance the lives of Vancouver’s inner city children. Donations to registered charities twice a year - once in the spring and once in the fall.
• Face the World Foundation - Face the World’s mandate is to help those organizations that might otherwise fall through the fundraising cracks. With a special focus on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, it funds agencies who work on issues related to sickness, homelessness, mental illness and drug, alcohol and physical abuse.

• Neighbourhood Matching Fund - The Neighbourhood Matching Fund is a Parks Board program providing support for projects involving people in a way that promotes the development of community and builds neighbourhood connections. It provides funds to groups who want to improve and develop parks and facilities on park land. Donations of time, money and/or materials, equal to the amount requested from the Neighbourhood Matching Fund must be provided by the community.

• Neighbourhood Small Grants - Funded by the Vancouver Foundation and administered through the following Neighbourhood Houses - Cedar Cottage, Collingwood, Frog Hollow, Little Mountain, Mt. Pleasant and Strathcona. These small grants (up to $500) are intended to support community-building initiatives at the neighbourhood level. For more information, contact the Neighbourhood House closest to you.

• United Way of the Lower Mainland - United Way funding allows agencies to engage in the development of innovative social programs, conduct short, medium and long-term planning and respond to changing community needs.

• VanCity Community Community Foundation - The Vancity Community Foundation (VCF) is dedicated to developing long-term relationships with its community partners. VCF annual grants budget is $175,000 and grants range from $500 to $20,000.

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Provincial

• BC Hydro Employees’ Community Services Fund
  The BC Hydro Employees' Community Services Fund supports British Columbia based registered charities in the health and social service sector. One provincial and four regional agencies are selected by the HYDRECS Committee to receive funding support for their capital fundraising efforts. For further information on submitting a special project application, visit the HYDRECS website at www.bchydro.com/community.

• Coast Capital Savings Foundation - Coast Capital Savings is dedicated to promoting its vision of growing strong, confident, healthy young Canadians. The Foundation focuses its support on initiatives, programs and partnerships that build or enhance leadership skills for youth. The Foundation welcomes grant applications from registered non-profit organizations who meet the Foundation’s funding criteria.

• Community Futures - Funding Metapage - A range of resources and information on funding and support for community development in BC. The primary focus is support for social, economic, and environmental community development initiatives in rural areas, however the programs are not necessarily exclusive to rural.

• First Peoples’ Cultural Foundation - The First Peoples’ Cultural Foundation is a not-for-profit charitable public organization that generates support to raise awareness and funding for Aboriginal language revitalization. The Foundation works with its sister organization, the First Peoples’ Heritage, Language and Culture Council to ensure fair and equal access for all funds raised and to all programs available.

• Hamber Foundation - The Hamber Foundation makes grants for cultural, educational and charitable purposes within the Province of British Columbia. The Foundation prefers to support specific projects rather than contributing to general sustaining assistance or to large capital projects. The Foundation also reviews major grant proposals from time to time.

• Law Foundation of BC - The Law Foundation of British Columbia is a non-profit foundation created by legislation in 1969 to receive and distribute the interest on clients’ funds held in lawyers’ pooled trust accounts maintained in financial institutions. The Legal Profession Act directs the Law Foundation to distribute these funds in five areas: legal education; legal research; legal aid; law reform; and law libraries.

• Leon and Thea Koerner Foundation - The Leon and Thea Koerner Foundation provides grants to stimulate and invigorate the cultural and educational communities in British Columbia by enabling institutions, organizations or individuals to undertake programs and/or projects which would not be possible without special assistance. To this end, the Foundation receives and considers grant applications in these four areas: Cultural and Creative Arts, Social Services, Higher Education, and Grants in Aid.

• Miverva Foundation - The Minerva Foundation for BC Women was initiated in 1999 to provide funds for projects that will assist women to realize their potential and to create a safe place for them to live and work in British Columbia. We will support innovative projects aimed at providing opportunities for women in one of our four priority areas: Education, Safety, Economic Security and Leadership Development.

• Provincial Direct Access Grants - Offered through the Provincial Government’s Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch, Direct Access grants provide funding to eligible non-profit organizations for direct delivery to their communities of approved, ongoing programs. Programs must have operated for at least 12 months prior to application and must fall into one of the following five sectors: Arts, Culture and Sport; the Environment; Human and Social Services; Public Safety; and Parent Advisory Councils and District Parent Advisory Councils.

• Vancouver Foundation - Vancouver Foundation supports a wide range of projects that are of benefit to British Columbians. Funded activities often provide a direct service to the community, or take an innovative approach to a community concern.

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National

• Canadian Heritage (HRSDC) Grants - Canadian Heritage overseas a range of grant and funding programs - covering everything to multiculturalism and settlement, diversity, aboriginal communities, youth, arts and sports.
• Canadian Women’s Foundation - This foundation raises money and makes grants to help stop violence against women and build economic independence for women and their children.

• CMHC External Research Grants - CMHC’s External Research Program offers funding assistance to help Canadian researchers carry out research investigations on topics related to housing. The intent of the program is to encourage and draw out new ideas, innovative solutions, and better understanding of housing issues. ERP grants, which may be up to $25,000, are available for a limited number of research projects each year.

• J.W. McConnell Family Foundation - The McConnell Foundation seeks to work strategically at a national level by helping to link people, places and ideas, and create an enhanced sense of community by building bridges between people, communities and sectors. The Foundation explore ways to address pressing social problems by helping organizations achieve long-term systemic change. A range of grants are available.

• The Maytree Foundation - The Maytree Foundation is a private Canadian charitable foundation established in 1982. The Foundation is committed to reducing poverty and inequality in Canada and to building strong civic communities. A range of program and capacity-building supports are available. Maytree’s grants program focuses on organizations working with immigrant and refugee issues.

Other Directories of Funders

• National Crime Prevention Centre. A List of Funders in the areas of Crime Prevention, Social Development, Capacity Building, and Research (PDF, 613KB) - March 2006

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