OTF — Economic Recovery and Resilience Fund

Who is eligible?

• CRA-registered charitable organizations or foundations
• Incorporated not-for-profit corporations without share capital (in a Canadian jurisdiction)
• Collaboratives of two or more organizations (with an eligible lead organization)

Who is not eligible

• Organizations based in York, Durham, Toronto, Peel, or Halton (Greater Toronto Area)

Eligible expenses

• Project-specific staff salaries (full-time and part-time)
• Purchased services (consultants/contractors/subject experts) for project delivery
• Equipment purchase or rental; materials and supplies
• Travel, food (project delivery), honorariums, and communications/promotional costs
• Capacity building/professional development (up to $3,000/year) and project learning & evaluation (up to 10% of total grant request)
• Project-related overhead/administration (up to 15% of the total YOF grant budget)

Ineligible Costs and Activities

• Capital infrastructure projects (e.g., renovations to space)
• Costs related to political or religious activities
• General or ongoing operating costs unrelated to the project
• Bursaries, scholarships, sponsorships, individual requests, or regranting to other projects/people
• Fundraising campaigns

Eligible geographic areas

• Ontario (all project activities must take place in Ontario)
• Communities outside the Greater Toronto Area (GTA)

• Organization experience and capacity to advance the selected outcome (40%)
• Strategy and impact to support the selected beneficiaries and outcome (35%)
• Project plan and budget quality and feasibility (25%)

• Step 1: Pre-application coaching call
  • Review eligibility requirements.
  • Book and complete the required one-on-one pre-application coaching call (required to be eligible to apply).
• Step 2: Organization registration
  • Register your organization with OTF (or confirm/update an existing OTF profile via YOF).
  • If applying as a collaborative, the lead organization completes registration.
  • YOF verifies the eligibility of all organizations at this step.
• Step 3: Application preparation
  • Review the grant application questions.
  • Select one fund outcome and describe how the project advances it.
  • Prepare the project plan and budget using only eligible cost items.
• Step 4: Submit the application
  • Access and submit the online grant application after completing the coaching call and registration.
  • Submit by the stated deadline (September 28, 2022, 5 PM ET — closed).

• YOF verifies organizational eligibility during the organization registration step.
• Applications are assessed by YOF staff and Grant Review Committee members, including an initial yes/no eligibility assessment.
• Applicants are notified of the application status approximately 3 months after the deadline.
• If approved, grantees participate in monitoring and submit a progress report and/or final report, including reporting on key metrics and learnings.
• 10% of funds are held back and released after the final report is approved; grants may be selected for a compliance audit during or after the grant term.

• Maximum grant term length is 24 months.
• No future deadlines: all funds have been allocated and there are no further granting rounds.
• Projects must start on January 3, 2023 (per the application questions).
• Two written quotes are required for individual goods and/or services over $10,000 (may be requested during assessment or if approved).