October Newsletter Entry - CNA Journal By Ros & Patrick

By Ros Rice, Executive Officer.

Me and my amazing team of two others have been talking about funding issues lately.  For years and years our sector has had trouble accessing funding.  We have had multitudes of solutions put in front of us.  Social enterprise; funding forums; organisations trying to act as backbones for others; fundraising activities; hiring fundraisers; asking people to contribute through their bank accounts with regular payments; asking people to leave money in their wills; contracting of services; but still our sector is left always struggling to survive financially. 

We are wanting to start thinking outside the box about this issue.  Are there things we simply haven’t considered?  Can we learn something from profit making organisations that we could put into practice?  Are there place, spaces and people we could work alongside with, that enable us to grow our funding?  How do our largest NGOs manage to survive financially? Have we considered a sector bank? 

Just throwing out some of the questions we have posed ourselves.  Do you have any ideas or thoughts?  Send me an email eo@communitynetworksaotearoa.org.nz 

Patrick's Hot Take! 🔥

It’s that time kia ora, Talofa… 

Yup, a whole bunch of legislation will land over the next little while. The Incorporated Societies Act has begun – you can look at our webpage on what you need to do over the next 2 or so years; the Charities Amendment Act and the Financial Reporting changes all fall into place over the next 6 months with a number of changes starting in the new year. 

Now, we aint no lawyers but we do know a number of very smart people in the Sector and around the Motu. CNA does its best to stay on top of all the changes and it’s a great comfort to be able to have such a plethora of excellent members who are great at sharing. One of our best resources is ourselves. CNA looks to lawyers and accountants for the finer details, but it's you who we look to for examples of employing protocols and processes that put these legislative changes into the real world. 

Did you know that our Tick for Governance course is chocca-blocked with templates, policies, and examples that mainly come from our membership? Why recreate the wheel when we can share content that is road-tested already? 

It's one of the ways that our membership helps us support and resource our Sector and our other members. That’s why we love it when you ring in for help or advice – because if we can’t help you, we probably know who can. Our membership is one big resource, and we’re always thrilled when we can connect you to each other to assist. Together we are stronger, together we can help.