Christmas Future
The holiday drinks have been released at Starbucks and I’m beginning to see the first signs of the Christmas shopping season. Ugh. The idea of wandering through malls searching for meaningful, yet affordable gifts for my family makes me slightly nauseous.
I love the idea of Christmas, but in practice it just seems to be stress, pressure and expectations… for what? For another pile of stuff. I’m dreading it already.
Then I discovered Christmas Future. What a brilliant idea!
The idea is that instead of spending hundreds of dollars on presents this year we can take some of that money and refocus it. We have the power to change the world and end poverty. That sounds like a damn good Christmas present to me.
“ChristmasFuture is about change. Fundamental, meaningful, planet-shifting change. We are a passionate movement of people empowering a non-profit organization that advances us – all of us – everyday closer to eradicating extreme poverty.”
I love the idea of Christmas, but in practice it just seems to be stress, pressure and expectations… for what? For another pile of stuff. I’m dreading it already.
Then I discovered Christmas Future. What a brilliant idea!
The idea is that instead of spending hundreds of dollars on presents this year we can take some of that money and refocus it. We have the power to change the world and end poverty. That sounds like a damn good Christmas present to me.
“ChristmasFuture is about change. Fundamental, meaningful, planet-shifting change. We are a passionate movement of people empowering a non-profit organization that advances us – all of us – everyday closer to eradicating extreme poverty.”
posted by Ryann @ 22:01
3 Comments:
At 5:10 PM,
Unknown said…
Ryann, I just checked their website and they say that they are a Registered Charity. But they are not registered with Canada Revenue Agency as a Charitable Organizationc, so no donation receipt for Canadians. Also I looked at their financial stmts for last year and the biggest expense was "Travel" and the second biggest was "Professional fees". No charitable works!
At 12:03 AM,
Ryann said…
James...
I looked into your concerns and here's what came back fronm the founder.
You asked two questions, so I'll respond to both of them as best I can:
(1) We are a registered charity with Revenue Canada and we grant charitable tax receipts. We are doing this right now. We are registered as ChristmasFuture Foundation. Our BN/Charity Registration Number is 85027 7120 RR 0001. We were registered in Vancouver, BC. I do not know why your friend could not find this information.
(2) Financials.
This is ChristmasFuture's first year live. In 2006, we only had operational expenses associated with preparing to launch the site this year. We didn't have any projects to give to and, at that time, we were not raising money for projects, but to get our site running (finding partners, etc.)
You note that we only paid $4000 dollar in salaries and benefits. Essentially, we did not even have employees, so I think it is fair to say that paying for travel expenses for our unpaid staff is a fair expense.
I note that the money raised for our pilot project last year will be part of our 2007 audited financial.
Have a look at our 2006 auditted financial at: http://www.christmasfuture.org/about-us/legal/.
At 1:26 PM,
Unknown said…
Thanks for the info, Ryann.
When I searched, I used Calgary as their address because their site that city as their office.
I have now found their name on the CRA Charities list.
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