The PEGG

November 2001

Good News, Bad News

BY DENNIS BROOKS, P.ENG., P.GEOPH.
President, APEGGA Education Foundation

In this issue of the PEGG, we once again acknowledge the contribution of our many donors to the APEGGA Education Foundation (see full-page acknowledgement on Page 11). The good news is that we continue to show year over year growth as evidenced in the accompanying chart. The information for 2001 is preliminary and doesn't cover the whole year, but it indicates that the trends continue: good year-over-year growth in donations, and modest increases in the number of donors and average amount of a donation.

DONOR STATISTICS

* unaudited ** to 2001 Sept. 30

I think the work of our Education Foundation Board made up of volunteers is also good news. We have advanced the Millenium Scholarship to the point where we will be able to announce a recipient for this year and at an amount of $1,500, which is more than first thought possible. We have increased our exposure by articles in the PEGG and on the APEGGA website.

We have advertised for new Foundation volunteers and got several applications. We have approved a policy on soliciting of donations. We have appointed a Treasurer and improved our system of accounts.

The bad news is that we are going to be hard pressed to achieve a donations goal of $50,000, or about $2 per APEGGA member. With your help, that goal is still possible. Clearly, even that goal will mean a very slow build-up in our endowment funds.

We have not yet been able to develop a campaign to attract major donors or to run profitable fund raising events. At our September board meeting and follow-up discussions with APEGGA Council Executive Committee, we began consideration of hiring a manager or using consultants to deal with these shortcomings. Additional revenues will have to significantly exceed the costs of moving to this mode of operation, but we are about at the limit of running the Foundation with volunteers only.

In my last column, I identified that we need contributions of money, time and ideas. There is still time left in this year to get started. As year end approaches, people consider their charitable giving and its tax implications. Tax credits are obscured by their way of applying Non Refundable Tax Credits, but for year 2000 returns, charitable donations gave a credit of 25 to 30% . Put another way, this meant that you could give that much more to charities without noticing the difference to the bottom line! In the coming tax year, application of Alberta's flat tax will alter the credit in a way I've not yet been able to determine.

On our APEGGA website tab, we have a place for "Opinions Wanted". The response to our questions has been disappointingly small so far, but we need feedback from you to help us deal with some controversial issues such as recognition of donors, and use of pledge systems. We would also like to know about use of affinity cards, casinos as fundraisers, and functioning of the Foundation and will put these in the column if we can get a better response. Give us your feedback! I will update response to our need for donations, time, and ideas in remaining columns this year.