November 22, 2022
In our first article, we hope we convinced you that the CRA needs to change its approach and be proactive in taking measures to attract new volunteers. In this second article of the series, we review what the CRA has recently said about its plans for volunteer recruitment. It relies primarily on the volunteer recruitment efforts of its host organizations to grow its volunteer base. Yet the evidence suggests this indirect approach, mediated via its host organizations, is not working.
In early 2020, the CRA’s Ombudsman released a report entitled “Reaching Out”. This report reviewed the CVITP and made numerous recommendations.
In May 2021, we briefly reviewed the CRA Ombudsman’s report on the CVITP. At that time, we offered two reasons why we think it is important that anyone with an interest in the CVITP should read the report:
- Its recommendations might be instrumental in getting the CRA to change its approach in a few areas.
- It gives outsiders a better understanding of the CRA’s thinking about the CVITP, in particular what it conceives of as feasible.
In the report, the Ombudsman made a specific recommendation about recruitment:
“The Taxpayers’ Ombudsman recommends the Canada Revenue Agency develop a volunteer retention and recruitment strategy, including necessary actions to ensure there are sufficient partner organizations, volunteers, resources, and filing methods, to expand Community Volunteer Income Tax Program services, especially in remote areas.”
Reaching Out, CRA Ombudsman Report (2020), Recommendation #6
What was the CRA’s response to that recommendation? It is well worth quoting their response at length as it gives one a good understanding of its approach to volunteer recruitment:
“The CRA agrees with this recommendation.
“In February 2019, the CRA opened three northern service centres in Whitehorse, Yellowknife, and Iqaluit to provide increased tax support to individuals and businesses throughout the territories year-round. This was in response to feedback received through the CRA’s Serving You Better consultations and as a result of recent research on barriers to tax filing. CRA employees in these centres are working to increase the awareness of benefits and credits among territorial residents, expand the CVITP, and help businesses meet their tax obligations.
“The CRA has recently restructured functional operations to place an increased focus on national partnerships and increased regional resources to ensure that organizations receive support to offer year-round tax clinics. Building new national partnerships, will contribute to the recruitment of additional volunteers as well as organizations offering tax clinics. The CRA will develop a strategy to articulate these steps by September 2020. In addition, the CRA is committed to increasing volunteer retention and recruitment by utilizing business intelligence to identify areas of greatest need, where gaps exist in terms of eligible tax filers, and where there is a requirement for additional tax clinics.
“The CRA will explore the feasibility of seeking financial authorities to pursue grants and contributions that could further help organizations in their retention and recruitment of volunteers.
“The CRA has also improved outreach and CVITP products by developing products in a number of third languages, updating products and new materials to demystify the CVITP for potential volunteers, and organizations to draw more people into the program.”
2020 CRA Response, Updates on CRA Service Improvements, Recommendation #6
While the CRA agreed with the recommendation to prepare a volunteer recruitment strategy, its response suggests that it believed growth in volunteer numbers would come through its efforts to build partnerships with additional host organizations. Funding for host organizations also appears to be one of the main ways the CRA thought it could help host organizations to recruit volunteers.
In 2021, the CRA provided an update to its response to the Ombudsman’s report. Let’s look at what the CRA had to say specifically about the above recommendation on developing a volunteer recruitment strategy:
“The CRA Response to Recommendation #6 (Recommendations fulfilled).
“The CRA is committed to developing its CVITP volunteer retention and recruitment strategy to improve the program’s service delivery.
“The CVITP’s digital services help bridge the gap between organizations, volunteers, and clients by helping to connect all of the various players in the program. Furthermore, the CVITP’s digital registration and online search tools not only direct potential clients to local clinics, but also facilitate connecting those who wish to volunteer with organizations that are looking for help. CVITP virtual tax clinics also have the benefit of reaching remote locations where individuals must otherwise travel vast distances in order to attend traditional in-person tax clinics.
“The CRA continues to recruit partner organizations and volunteers to expand the CVITP’s services, especially in remote areas.
“On January 7, 2021, the Minister of Revenue announced the CVITP grant program. Volunteers from community organizations across Canada help eligible people do their taxes for free through the CRA’s CVITP or through Revenue Quebec’s Income Tax Assistance – Volunteer Program (ITAVP). The CVITP Grant helps off-set costs incurred by community organizations that host free tax clinics and provides funding for income tax returns filed. The CVITP Grant is being piloted over the next three years. The grant opened in February 2021 for organizations and the CRA began accepting grant applications for funding in May 2021. This grant is administered by the CRA.
“The CRA continues to develop its CVITP training and product materials to meet the needs of organizations and volunteers, and CRA agents on the CVITP dedicated telephone line. The CVITP Webinar/PowerPoint was re-designed for the 2021 tax season. Training is now integrating more comprehensive CRA messaging (i.e. Canada Emergency Response Benefit and Work from Home in What’s New 2020). To ensure timely dissemination of information to CVITP organizations and volunteers, the CRA continues to modify CVITP processes to be more agile with integrating policy or program changes (i.e. refining PowerPoint topics). Additionally, the CRA updates its CVITP webpage as policy and procedure changes are implemented (i.e. Virtual Clinics are included in the volunteer training website landing page).
“This action plan item has been completed.”
2021 CRA Response, Updates on CRA Service Improvements, CRA Ombudsman, Recommendation #6
We have two observations about this update.
First, while the CRA admitted it had not yet developed a volunteer recruitment strategy – the central point of the Ombudsman’s recommendation – it viewed this recommendation as fulfilled (and thus will likely not be reporting any further on it). We find this to be somewhat bizarre.
Second, the CRA seemed to be pinning its hopes on its recently created pilot grant program for host organizations as an effective tool for helping host organizations with, among other things, volunteer recruitment.
We examined this pilot grant program when the CRA first announced. At that time, we concluded that the lack of targeting, the insufficient financing and the burdensome administrative arrangements would hamper the success of this program. The dramatic decline in host organizations in 2021 suggests this approach does not seem to be bearing any fruit.
This means one cannot count on growth in the number of host organizations to yield more volunteers. Nor should one expect any expansion of CVITP services through existing host organizations. Many host organizations – other than those with financial empowerment mandates – have very limited resources to dedicate to their CVITP service, including for the recruitment of volunteers. They may rely heavily on their existing volunteer roster or, where they offer other services as well, tap into the volunteer roster supporting these other services. Given they lack significant resources to dedicate toward the CVITP, it is understandable to think that they may in turn be relying on the CRA to recruit new volunteers for them.
(When new volunteers register with the CRA but do not specify a host organization to work with, the CRA regional coordinator may suggest the names of host organizations in their area. This seems to be the main way that host organizations get new volunteers through the CRA.)
What could the CRA do differently which might prove more effective? In our third article, we suggest a complementary approach.