Thank you for the article (Helping the helpful, March 27) highlighting the plight of the non-profit organizations on P.E.I. as a direct result of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic (with Habitat for Humanity P.E.I. as an example).
We, the Benevolent Irish Society, are also a non-profit and have been in service to the Irish community (+30,000 Islanders are of Irish descent on P.E.I.) and the greater Island community at large for 195 years.
The society keeps functioning mostly (75 per cent of our operating capital is earned revenue) on monies we earn through A) hall rentals, lectures and classes, B) the St. Patrick’s week activities and C) the six-month Friday night ceilidh season which starts May 15 and ends Oct. 24). We also receive 25 per cent of our operating capital through grants from two provincial funding bodies, for which we are most grateful.
Fortunately, we had just completed the 2020 St. Patrick’s week activities barely a mouse whisker before the P.E.I. health authority started to shut down all gatherings of 100 persons or more, so we were able to derive some immediate revenue from that source.
Our hall rentals, lectures and classes revenue stream has completely dried up for the immediate future and our ceilidh season scheduled to begin May 15 is now at risk.
I would estimate that we are one of 100+ non-profits on P.E.I., most of which are in the same situation as we are. Some are worse off because they have staff to pay, whereas we have only member volunteer help at the BIS. The normal bills keep coming in (e.g. electricity, oil, snow removal, building insurance ... ) but the revenue has stopped.
Some financial relief, even if only for a couple of months in recognition of the services provided to the community by the mostly volunteer work force of non-profits, would be most appreciated by either the provincial and/or federal government.
We will survive this (as we have survived for the last 195 years) by tightening our belts. However, there must be recognition that if the situation goes on for six months, as some sources now predict, a good many non-profits will not survive.
The non-profits are a “small bubbling stream economy” staffed mostly by volunteers, holding events and fundraisers to raise our operating capital. This money provides a vast number of services across the entire Island. At the same time, we are also paying our fair share to keep other organizations viable (e.g. oil, electricity). You may not realize the service you have come to depend on is being supplied by a non-profit organization. One day to the next it may simply be gone.
Government can’t offer a loan to a non-profit as we have no ability to pay a loan back. Revenue lost now is forever lost. Once the revenue stream starts back up, this much needed money must go to the bills of that month and so on and so forth.
Mary Ellen Callaghan is president of the Benevolent Irish Society in Charlottetown.
