How does Centraide determine
the agencies and projects it works with?
Centraide’s Board of Directors mandates a volunteer committee on investments in social development that will recommend names of agencies and initiatives as well as the amounts to be allocated.
Supported by a team of professionals, the role of this committee can be summarised in four questions:
1. What are the contributions that Centraide has agreed to make towards the efforts of local communities, in light of our regional analyses and the priorities determined by the community itself?
2. Is this project or agency relevant in terms of its mission and actions, given the contribution that Centraide wishes to make towards the efforts of this community?
3. Does the initiative or agency meet the performance criteria established by Centraide?
- Knows the existing social needs in its community and keeps abreast of emerging needs and solutions.
- Meets these needs by offering services that are consistent with its mission.
- Employs the necessary means to reach and serve the people it targets and to provide them with access to its activities.
Centraide’s strategy aims to support agencies in their fight against poverty and social exclusion.
- Offers its activities with a view to promoting the development of self-reliance and empowerment among the people it serves.
- Promotes the development of a feeling of belonging and citizen participation.
- Integrates into its activities strategies for self-help and mutual-aid among participants, as well as between participants and people outside the agency.
- Offers its activities on the basis of an inclusive approach both within the agency and in the agency’s relationships with the community, especially with respect to people from the various ethnocultural communities.
Centraide believes that people have the capacity to participate in defining and implementing solutions to the problems they are experiencing.
- Establishes precise qualitative and quantitative goals for its interventions with people.
- Implements an evaluation process for its intervention programs.
- Analyses and utilizes its evaluation results to draw findings that enable it to better understand the needs of its clientele and, if necessary, to review its practices or its work.
- Presents its results in the documents it produces, and distributes these documents (e.g. its activity report).
Above and beyond volume of activity and number of people reached, Centraide is interested in the results the agencies achieve in relation to their intervention goals.
- Has a good knowledge of its community and of the social development stakeholders who are active in it.
- Develops collaborative partnerships with the other social stakeholders in its community so as to implement solutions that are more complete.
- Participates in joint social development planning and action committees concerned with the social development of its community, with the aim of developing and working according to a collective vision.
Centraide believes that by participating in community building at the local, sub-regional or regional levels, the agencies strengthen their contribution to social development.
- Is in good financial health and is careful to acquire the necessary resources for its operations, development and continuation.
- Manages its human (staff and volunteers), material and financial resources so as to best fulfill its mission.
- Plans all of its activities and reports on them annually to its members.
- Has clearly defined the roles and responsibilities of its authorities as well as its rules of governance.
- Organizes its associative life so as to enable the active participation of the community, including agency participants, in the decision-making process.
Centraide wishes to finance agencies that have recognized management and governance practices.
4. How much can we invest in this community while still ensuring a relatively fair distribution of our investments throughout the entire territory of Centraide of Greater Montreal?
Upon reading the questions above, you will understand how Centraide determines which agencies it supports, a rationale that differs from the “first come, first serve” basis.
Would you like to work with and obtain financial support from Centraide?
Agencies can express their interest in working with and getting support from Centraide.
Click here for the registration form. This page also has information about:
- The types of agencies or initiatives that Centraide supports
- The commitments between Centraide and the agency
