Not for Profit Law

What’s Wrong with the New Ontario Not for Profit Corporations Act

September 10th, 2012 by Brian Iler

While Ontario’s non‑profit law sorely needs updating, the Ontario government’s recent initiative to do so has resulted in a deeply flawed replacement.

In drafting the new ONCA, the government prioritized two objectives:

  • Ensuring it closely mirrors the law applicable to businesses
  • Empowering members to participate more fully in a corporation’s activities.

While there’s much to modernize about non‑profit corporate law, the introduction of many business law concepts was not tempered by the differing realities of the non‑profit world.

Couple that with a highly legalistic drafting style, the new Act will be inaccessible for many, and  force many less sophisticated non‑profits to seek more legal advice than they might have in the past.

The result: an Act that is certainly not responsive to, or knowledgeable about, the sector.

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Principles for Community Financing – A new paper from the ONN

July 25th, 2012 by Iler Campbell LLP

The Ontario Nonprofit Network has just released a new discussion document, “Principles for Community Financing in Ontario” (pdf) into which Brian Iler had considerable input.

The paper is intended to provide a foundation for collective action and discussion on the topic of nonprofit financing. Towards this goal, it lays out eight foundational principles for community financing which the authors, the Ontario Social Economy Roundtable, a constellation of the ONN, hope will contribute to greater understanding and engagement in the field of community based financing in Ontario and in other jurisdictions.

ONN requests delay of proclamation of Ontario Not for Profit Corporations Act

July 12th, 2012 by Iler Campbell LLP

On Monday, the Ontario Nonprofit Network sent a letter to Minister Best, the Premier and Minister Sousa requesting a delay of the proclamation of Ontario Not‑for‑Profit Corporations Act (ONCA) which is currently scheduled for January 1, 2013 to come into effect January 1, 2016. The letter argues that the Act will do serious harm to the operation of not‑for‑profit organizations and the communities they serve and that the costly and complex transition to the new act is ultimately unnecessary. We agree and hope the McGuinty government gets the message.

Read the letter here (pdf). Read more about the act and its impact on ONNs site. See our previous coverage of the ONCA here.

New Ontario Not-for-Profit Act Update

May 25th, 2012 by Brian Iler

From Wednesday’s Ministry advisory committee meeting:

  • Target proclamation date is January 1, 2013.
  • Incorporation will be available on line and instant – This is great news. The current process involves weeks long waiting periods.
  • A Guide to the new Act, transition checklist and default bylaw will be available this summer. (We’ve had substantial input into the drafting of these.)

We’ll keep you updated with new news as we hear it.

ONN Asks the Minister of Consumer Services to Make Amendments to the Ontario Not-for-Profit Corporations Act

December 6th, 2011 by Iler Campbell LLP

The Ontario Nonprofit Network writes, in a press release:

The Ontario Not-For-Profit Corporations Act (ONCA) is due to be proclaimed in the fall of 2012. However, many organizations in the nonprofit sector will have great difficulty using the Act and face the risk of it destabilizing the governance mechanisms of their organizations. We believe that our proposed amendments to the Act, as outlined in the attached brief (pdf), will make it a model piece of nonprofit corporate legislation.

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The Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act in force as of October 17, 2011

October 18th, 2011 by Iler Campbell LLP

The clock is now ticking.  Federally incorporated non-profit organizations have until October 17, 2014 to make the transition to the new Not-for-profit Corporations Act.  Failure to transition to the new Act means dissolution.

Continue reading “The Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act in force as of October 17, 2011”