Our club is a proud sponsor of Wellspring Edmonton. They are a community-based support centre offering non-medical supportive programs and services that meet the emotional, social, practical and restorative needs of people living with cancer and those who care for them. All programs, services & resources are offered free of charge and without a referral.
Thank you to Marilyn and Martin for hosting us. We spent a lovely evening at their facility, learnt more about the programs, and had a tour. We also painted a 'touchstone' for patients at the Cross Cancer Institute.
Edmonton West News
If you need any Ice Melt, and lets face it......we all need Ice Melt, then see Ken Brander for details on this awesome fundraiser.
Filing a tax return is critical for low-income Canadians given that income tax and government benefits are inherently intertwined. Failure to complete an annual income tax return results in loss of access to essential government programs for families and individuals who would otherwise qualify. Filing an income tax return incorrectly can be just as detrimental, however there are often barriers preventing low-income people from seeking professional help…. Edmonton based charity, E4C’s Make Tax Time Pay Programis one organization who offers free financial services to low income families and individuals to complete their income tax return, apply for government benefits and subsidies, and gain additional information and education on related financial resources.
Darrel Ripley, as Vocation Chair, would like to see us volunteer for this program. If you would like more details please contact him. Here is an overview of what is involved:
Tax sites will be located all over the city. If we have six volunteers we can work with E4C to set up a custom site in our respective club areas. The six volunteers would be made up of four tax preparers, a greeter and a scheduler. Jasmine will email us a list of the current sites.
In addition to the attached positions Jasmine is also looking for a volunteer with IT experience. She will provide us with a job description once it's completed. The appointment scheduler can perform the role from home or offsite as they will be provided with a cell phone;
Training and orientation is held in February and March on Saturdays and each training session is approximately three hours. Training will include common questions/scenarios and scripting. Training sessions will go over the roles and provide each volunteer with a manual. The training will also include direction on the auto fill process.
The tax preparers may occasionally do back tax preparation for up to 10 years;
Volunteers need to have a police check dated within six months and will need to register for e-file. Volunteers that have back tax owing with CRA will not be able to participate as tax filers.
This is a wonderful service for people with qualifying income to access tax credits, GST rebate, Canada learning bonds and other government programs that are instigated through the filing of a tax return.
Morris Maduro is a retired professor and Faculty Club member, and while there on Monday for lunch meeting with a colleague, he saw us setting up, and met Al Sanderson. He advised him that he had been a Rotary Foundation Grad Studies Fellow in 1967, having been awarded it from Evanston ,Rotary headquarters. He told us his story.....