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If we want to talk about oil industry sponsorship and philanthropy in #skpoli, lets take a closer look. It just so happens that we did an extensive study! https://www.policyalternatives.ca/prairie-patchwork
The report is based on 25 with municipal councillors and administrators, farmers and landowner orgs, conservation orgs, reps from community and human services, school teachers and reps from oil companies across 8 unnamed oil-producing municipalities in Sk
As one community economic development officer explained, towns lack the taxation powers to adequately capture their needed share of oil revenues from the developments in their backyards.
While Rural Municipalities face increased costs for infrastructure — refurbishing roads and bridges to deal with increased truck traffic — they may have fewer costs associated with the boom relative to nearby towns or cities where the majority of services are located.
An executive at a local oil firm: "There’s the benevolent factor, but a lot of times, some of these decisions are, I would say they are always business decisions. And that’s not to make it sound cold, but investment in your community is a business decision. 1/2
An exec at local oil firm: "A donation for tax purposes is a business decision, and I think that there’s always such a greater net benefit that people can maybe quantify or try to look at it in the simpler term, right?" 2/2
private charity is not subject to democratic deliberation. It is usually sole discretion of the philanthropist. Where it is directed not determined or coordinated by the community + may bypass more pressing or important needs of the community in favour of interests of funder.
Funds can be altered or withdrawn at the whim of the philanthropist, jeopardizing the stability and continuity of much-needed services. Over reliance on industry may make organizations reticent to offend their sponsors and/or challenge or criticize their operations.
There is also the question of the equity of philanthropy itself as more affluent communities can draw upon a larger pool of philanthropy than more distressed communities
This reliance is a direct result of the provincial government’s underfunding of public infrastructure and services and the inability of some local municipalities to capture sufficient revenue from the oil development in their backyards.
Many Sk municipalities have had to rely on oil industry philanthropy for the provision of essential infrastructure and public services that most would consider to be the sole purview of government.
