CharityVillage® Research: Compas survey offers direction in nonprofit accountability debate

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Compas survey offers direction in nonprofit accountability debate
April 16, 1997; Canadian FundRaiser

Last fall, Revenue Canada commissioned Compas to survey 300 senior charity officials on the issue of increased public disclosure and accountability. The results of the survey showed that nearly three quarters of charity leaders support increased disclosure, with nearly half offering strong support. The sector was slightly more divided on the issue of accountability, however, with just over half (52 per cent) seeing a need for more accountability by charities.
Of those officials supporting increased disclosure, most cited the need to allow the public to see how the money is spent as the main reason to disclose more. The main opposing arguments included thinking that greater disclosure is not needed (cited by 43 per cent) or that the sector should develop its own guidelines (31 percent). Strong majorities, however, felt that it was either very or somewhat reasonable to require disclosure of all information in a charity's Revenue Canada file, with the exception of correspondence between the charity and Revenue Canada.
Support was also strong for disclosure of information about applicants, and reasons for the denial of an organization's application for charitable status. Similarly, almost 80 per cent saw as reasonable the disclosure of reasons for revocation of a charity's registration. The main perceived benefits of greater disclosure were increased awareness of charities and more public confidence, greater transparency/openness, and abuse prevention.
Charities should control information distribution
With greater public disclosure, officials also indicated a strong preference that the public access the information by contacting the charity instead of Revenue Canada. However, despite their desire to control information distribution, the charities also expressed concern about the lack of human resources to cope with new information requests. These compliance burdens and potential misuse of information topped the list of perceived disadvantages to increased disclosure.
The charitable groups most supportive of increased accountability in the sector were small charities, health/benefits to the community charities, executive directors and Quebec-based charities.
Public also supports greater accountability
The survey showed that the general public is also very supportive of greater accountability for charities and increased public disclosure. Seventy-one per cent of respondents saw a need for greater accountability and 83 per cent saw it as reasonable to require disclosure of all information in a charity's Revenue Canada file.
The public groups most supportive of greater accountability included men, older, more educated and higher income people, those living in communities of 100,000 to 500,000 people, and Francophones (and Quebecers).
Unlike the charities' preference for distributing information themselves, the public had a slight preference for accessing information through Revenue Canada (49 per cent) instead of going directly to the charity (43 per cent). However, 83 per cent of respondents believed that allowing the public to view the information at the charity's office was reasonable.
With the most recent federal budget announcement, $5 million will go towards enhanced accountability for the sector. It remains to be seen just how this goal will be achieved, but the Compas survey suggests some options for future discussion and debate.