Federation of Calgary Communities

We are The Federation of Calgary Communities, but don’t let our name fool you! While our roots are in the community association movement in Calgary and our name is part of our legacy, our work is dedicated to building capacity for small, volunteer-led non-profits in Calgary and surrounding areas. We use “community” as an inclusive word that reflects more than the geographic community; it is meant to include all the different spaces where volunteers come together to make an impact, no matter their passion.

We have grown our impact within the voluntary sector by attracting and supporting an incredible range of diverse non-profits through our programs, services, and educational offerings. In addition, many who join also recognize the collaborative power and energy of our network. As of 2022, we have 243 members from a variety of sectors:
• 10 arts
• 149 community associations
• 3 crime prevention
• 5 cultural
• 10 educational
• 7 environmental
• 17 recreational
• 27 social service organizations
• 2 others

We are a member-based organization but are mindful that many clients only need help with one issue. Membership is not mandatory. Since October 2021, we have supported, free of charge, 53 additional non-profit organizations. These organizations were from across the sectors listed above, while adding health, housing, and professional associations. In addition, we have co-chaired Board Leadership Calgary for eight years, adding to our reach.

Our clients are organizations that are often sparsely funded, they have few, if any, management staff, and have operating boards led by volunteers with limited experience. They often do not have robust strategic plans, operating budgets, policies and procedures, or basic technology to manage day to day communications, document storage, accounting or the like. Most struggle to build their own operational capacity.

The Federation provides our clients support and resources in volunteer engagement, community building, governance, political advocacy, fund development, and financial literacy. The Federation’s value proposition lies in our financial literacy work. In fact, The Federation is the only non-profit in Alberta, or for that matter within Canada, that offers financial audit service along with education. All our services help to build our clients’ leadership, management, and operational capacity.
We measure what we do. We can show that our clients’ understanding of non-profit governance and financial literacy increases year over year. Clients also report increased confidence and ability to meet their own organization’s needs.

The Federation has invested in our own operational/technical and management capacity. We have implemented new software to better assist our clients and have deepened our own work on attraction and retention of staff. Like most of our peers, we are experiencing higher staff turnover. Our progress is slow and has been delayed, largely due to turnover.
We are a capacity-builder of small non-profits, supporting passionate people who give back, no matter the cause. We are proud of our work, and we know with an ECAP investment we could build our own capacity, continue to build the capacity of others, and make an even greater impact in serving the voluntary sector.