About
Advisory Team and Administration
Funding Partners
Funded Initiatives
Publications
About
The Community Economic Development Technical Assistance Program (CEDTAP) was Canada’s largest non-profit (non-governmental) granting agency in the field of Community Economic Development (CED). National in scope, this bilingual program served all provinces and territories in Canada. CEDTAP provided grants to Community-based Organizations (CBOs) and also promoted activities that strengthen the CED sector as a whole. CEDTAP assisted over 400 CED agencies in support of leading-edge, community development initiatives to create new, sustainable economic development solutions in disadvantaged communities throughout Canada.
Advisory Team and Administration
CEDTAP’s advisory panel included the following members:
Lisa Banks
Paul Born
David Driscoll
Katherine A. H. Graham
Ted Jackson
Barbara Levine
Margie Mendell
Funding Partners
CEDTAP was founded in 1997 by The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation and Carleton University in response to the obvious economic and social challenges facing many Canadians. It became the largest source of grants for community economic development projects in Canada and a focal point for expert groups engaged in CED.
More than $3 million was invested to help support close to 100 CED projects across Canada in Phase I (1997-2000) of the CEDTAP program.
CEDTAP launched Phase II of the program in 2001 in response to the increased demand for CED project funding in communities throughout Canada. The initial funder for this phase is The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, whose $5 million investment formed the basis for a true public/private partnership opportunity for foundations, corporations and governments alike.
On May 20, 2004, Bell Canada announced a philanthropic gift of $1 million to Carleton University to enable CEDTAP to undertake the management of the Bell Community Economic Development Fund. This represented a leading-edge partnership whereby both organizations committed $1 million each for a total of $2 million over the period 2004-2007 to support up to 100 Community Economic Development (CED) initiatives nation-wide.
Funded Initiatives
CEDTAP has funded many initiatives during its existence.
Publications
Knowledge For Strong Communities: Reflecting on Ten Years of CEDTAP
Edward T. Jackson
The purpose of this report is to summarize the main achievements, limits, and lessons of the implementation of the Community Economic Development Technical Assistance Program (CEDTAP) during the period 1997-2007. The report reviews ten theme in CEDTAP’s work and draws 35 lessons for practitioners, policy-makers and scholars. Read the report.
Measuring Social Value in CSR by Co-operatives
How can major co-operatives and public enterprises measure the social value created by their corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities? A recent paper on this subject by Ted Jackson, Karim Harji and Alison Colwell was presented to the 27th International CIRIEC Conference held in Seville from September 22 through 24, 2008. Entitled “Measuring Social Value in CSR: Lessons from Community Enterprise in Canada,” the paper drew on previous CEDTAP-inspired research on both corporate engagement and CED evaluation. The authors argue that the Expanded Value Added Statement (EVAS) is one tool that should be added to the CSR benchmarking toolkit for major co-operatives and public enterprises. EVAS can quantify the value of employee volunteering in CSR initiatives as well as other intangibles generated by CSR initiatives. The paper suggests that universities can play a useful role working jointly with external partners in testing, refining and disseminating the use of EVAS and other tools in order to strengthen CSR performance and the benefits it generates for enterprises, workers and communities. For a copy of the full paper, please click here.
How Ottawa Doesn’t Spend: The Rapid Appearance and Disappearance – and Possible Reappearance – of the Federal Social Economy Initiative
Edward T. Jackson
See Dr. Jackson’s chapter in The twenty-ninth edition of How Ottawa Spends. This edition, edited by Dr. Allan M. Maslove, focuses on the policies of the Harper government and the course of federal-provincial relations. Leading scholars of Canadian public policy explore several key policy areas, including fiscal balance in the federation, tax policy, regulatory capacity, the federal funding of territorial and northern Aboriginal governments, child care policy, higher education policy, telecommunications policy, and the rapid appearance and disappearance of the federal social economy initiative – i.e., “how Ottawa doesn’t spend.” For information on this latest edition, please click here.
Introduction to the Case Studies and Tools on Corporate Sector Engagement in CED
Edward Jackson
Chair, Carleton Centre for Community Innovation
The Community Economic Development Technical Assistance Program (CEDTAP, and its host organization, the Carleton Centre for Community Innovation (3ci), are pleased to publish this series of case studies and tools on corporate sector engagement in community economic development.
With the generous support of the Ontario Trillium Foundation, we have completed work on these reports with the aim of providing both corporate managers and CED leaders with useful information on how corporate-non-profit partnerships can be formed to the mutual benefit of both companies and CED organizations.
This series of publications has been prepared under the coordination of Karim Harji, who authored several case studies and “tool” papers. Other authors included Alison Colwell and Edward Jackson. Tessa Hebb, Managing Director of 3ci, advised the project, and Genevieve Harrison served as administrator.
Canada is blessed with a wealth of resources and talent. However, CED organizations in this country have relied too heavily on governments to fund their work. For their part, corporations have generally not connected meaningfully with the CED sector. Both sides can benefit from the kind of creative and effective partnerships detailed in these publications.
The cases and tools presented here highlight what is actually possible going forward. We hope you find these reports useful.
OVERVIEW
Strategies and Tools for Corporate Engagement in CED
CASE STUDIES
The Co-operators
Home Depot and Habitat for Humanity
Social Capital Partners and Active Green + Ross
Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) and Alterna Savings
Meritas Mutual Funds
Loblaws-Dixon Hall
ReBooting CED Technology
Syncrude
TOOLS
Social Purchasing Portal
Social Return on Investment
Expanded Value Added Statement (EVAS)
CEDTAP Dataset
About the Authors
Karim Harji coordinated this series. Currently a consultant with Aperio, a social innovation and management consulting firm based in Toronto, he previously served as Social Finance Program Officer at the Carleton Centre for Community Innovation and as a Researcher on blended value and program evaluation with the Community Economic Development Technical Assistance Program (CEDTAP), based at the Centre. Mr. Harji advises the Canadian Social Entrepreneurship Foundation on social impact and metrics, and is a member of the Emerging Leaders Committee of the Canadian CED Network. He has also worked on human rights policy at the Canadian International Development Agency, in microfinance in Pakistan and in community health in Kenya. Mr. Harji holds an MA in public policy from Carleton University.
Alison Colwell is a corporate communications consultant with the World Bank, and also serves as a consultant on the Organization of American States’ corporate social responsibility project in the Caribbean. Between 2005 and 2007, she worked as a Researcher on corporate sector engagement for CEDTAP, when she researched several of the papers published in this series. Ms. Colwell has worked extensively in Chile on CSR research projects, and has carried out assignments for the International Development Research Centre, Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, the United Nations Economic Commission of Latin America and the Caribbean, the American Red Cross and two multinational corporations. Ms. Colwell graduated in 2007 with an MA from Carleton University’s School of Public Policy and Administration.
Edward Jackson is Associate Dean (Research and Graduate Affairs) in the Faculty of Public Affairs at Carleton University. He also serves as Chair of the Carleton Centre for Community Innovation, and was a co-founder of CEDTAP. Over the past 15 years, in addition to working closely with governments, unions, foundations and civil society, he has played a key role in major partnerships with Bell Canada, the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Royal Bank of Canada, Power Corporation, and Rio Tinto Alcan.