You might have seen a big newspaper ad for The Trusts Community Trust Foundation’s distributions a few weeks ago. They were publishing their grants from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2016. And I’ve done my nerdy little thing to look at where their money has gone. Its quite interesting… the charitable purposes they can apply funds to are very wide ranging, so this profile is quite different from some of the other pokies.
These guys do give money to a variety of organisations across the board, including about 8% of last year’s money to the Environment! This is surprising: you may recall that in Canterbury, Environment only receives 1% of total grant money.
Of course there is the ubiquitous sport: sport received 26% of the total funds. Not as much as the others of course.
This challenges an assumption I had made about the sector: that venues were keen to support sport through their pokie take, as saw giving to sport as a way to pull in customers. This suggests that where the money goes to is perhaps a little less important to venues than I had assumed.
So where in New Zealand did the funds come from? Well, of course they are skewed by where the money was raised. Just over 80% of the money has come from Auckland. They have 54 venues, 18 of which are in Auckland, which I guess shows how much is put through those Auckland venues.
Just a wee hmmm moment: there was $1.1 million come in from Auckland venues in Onehunga and Henderson. Of that, some $184k has gone to trotting clubs – clubs from Auckland, through to Hamilton ($56,000!), to Oamaru and Rangiora. Harness Racing Waikato have their 2014 financials up on the internet: grants made up over $1m of revenue (28% of total revenue), up almost $1m from the prior year. And you might ask where that was spent: well, stakes rose $1.4m.
Now, forgive me if I’m wrong, but where is the line here between charitable purposes and propping up an industry? And just wondering if the good people of Onehunga and Henderson have no other needs for those funds?
And another: Plunket car seats. I see that Plunket is actually phasing this service out. Yet last year TTCF donated $350,000 to RNZPS Waitemata… in 2014 the total book value of these assets at this branch was $20k. And other Plunkets were told not to fund raise for these assets. It will be interesting to see what happens to these assets once the car seats are wound up. And it seems like a grant out of kilter with previous years… they received a total of 69k in 2013 and 68k in 2014. So how come the huge investment in an obsolete service line?
TTCF seem like one of the good pokies, in that they provide funding across the spectrum of NFP. And its marvellous to see that they use publicly elected officials, those in the Licensing Trust roles, to support them in making decisions about where grants go. That said, there has been some media comment about the relationships between those elected officials. But as far as diversity goes... well, the same comment as last time… as far as the organisation goes, it does seem to be very male dominant.
Of course the Class 4 consultation is currently happening, so if you care about this stuff please exercise your democratic right and respond. Mine is in draft: happy to share with anyone.
And while we are at it, this has come through on email....
Give charities fair funding
Update the regulations for funds from pokie machines to ensure equal funding is available to all kinds of charities instead of most of it going to sport. Charities providing social services, community projects, arts/culture and environmental protection deserve just as much funding as sports.
https://our.actionstation.org.nz/petitions/more-funding-for-social-services-community-and-environment
Would love to talk with you if you think this is just a little bit interesting.
These guys do give money to a variety of organisations across the board, including about 8% of last year’s money to the Environment! This is surprising: you may recall that in Canterbury, Environment only receives 1% of total grant money.
Of course there is the ubiquitous sport: sport received 26% of the total funds. Not as much as the others of course.
This challenges an assumption I had made about the sector: that venues were keen to support sport through their pokie take, as saw giving to sport as a way to pull in customers. This suggests that where the money goes to is perhaps a little less important to venues than I had assumed.
So where in New Zealand did the funds come from? Well, of course they are skewed by where the money was raised. Just over 80% of the money has come from Auckland. They have 54 venues, 18 of which are in Auckland, which I guess shows how much is put through those Auckland venues.
Just a wee hmmm moment: there was $1.1 million come in from Auckland venues in Onehunga and Henderson. Of that, some $184k has gone to trotting clubs – clubs from Auckland, through to Hamilton ($56,000!), to Oamaru and Rangiora. Harness Racing Waikato have their 2014 financials up on the internet: grants made up over $1m of revenue (28% of total revenue), up almost $1m from the prior year. And you might ask where that was spent: well, stakes rose $1.4m.
Now, forgive me if I’m wrong, but where is the line here between charitable purposes and propping up an industry? And just wondering if the good people of Onehunga and Henderson have no other needs for those funds?
And another: Plunket car seats. I see that Plunket is actually phasing this service out. Yet last year TTCF donated $350,000 to RNZPS Waitemata… in 2014 the total book value of these assets at this branch was $20k. And other Plunkets were told not to fund raise for these assets. It will be interesting to see what happens to these assets once the car seats are wound up. And it seems like a grant out of kilter with previous years… they received a total of 69k in 2013 and 68k in 2014. So how come the huge investment in an obsolete service line?
TTCF seem like one of the good pokies, in that they provide funding across the spectrum of NFP. And its marvellous to see that they use publicly elected officials, those in the Licensing Trust roles, to support them in making decisions about where grants go. That said, there has been some media comment about the relationships between those elected officials. But as far as diversity goes... well, the same comment as last time… as far as the organisation goes, it does seem to be very male dominant.
Of course the Class 4 consultation is currently happening, so if you care about this stuff please exercise your democratic right and respond. Mine is in draft: happy to share with anyone.
And while we are at it, this has come through on email....
Give charities fair funding
Update the regulations for funds from pokie machines to ensure equal funding is available to all kinds of charities instead of most of it going to sport. Charities providing social services, community projects, arts/culture and environmental protection deserve just as much funding as sports.
https://our.actionstation.org.nz/petitions/more-funding-for-social-services-community-and-environment
Would love to talk with you if you think this is just a little bit interesting.
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