Rethink Campaigns

Legal Action Against Vivian Krause: Request for Dismissal (SLAPP)

Under the Protection of Public Participation Act, I have applied for the dismissal of a claim brought against me, Vivian Krause (who writes this blog), as of May 24, 2022.

This claim was brought by Scott Cousens, a Vancouver business person.

Mr. Cousens says that he gave $23 million towards a sports centre in Burnaby, B.C., formerly Fortius Sport & Health Centre, now named Christine Sinclair Community Centre.

Mr. Cousens claimed that his donation was "the largest charitable gift in Canadian sports history" and that he spent his sons' inheritance to make this historic gift.

However, on the basis of the detailed financial analysis that I have summarized in an affidavit, it is clear to me that Mr. Cousens' claim that he made a $23 million donation is deceptive and misleading. At best, in my view, Mr. Cousens' claim is an exaggeration of his true economic contribution towards the Sports Centre because it appears that his donations were used to make a loan, not a true gift.

I am also concerned because one of Mr. Cousens' charities, Fortius Foundation, received a gift of $74.7 million from Charitable Impact Foundation, a Vancouver charity known as "CHIMP." According to information provided to me by the CRA, this is the largest gift to a non-governmental organization in the history of British Columbia.

CHIMP claims to be "the fastest-growing giving network and donor-advised fund in Canada" and says that it has received $1.1 billion in donations.

In my view, based on my detailed financial analysis, CHIMP's claim that it made a gift of $74.7 million is misleading. As I document in my affidavit, this "gift" was part of a series of circular, self-cancelling transactions. The $74.7 million was used to pay "debts" to five sister charities which then made "gifts" to CHIMP such that CHIMP got its money back in the form of notes receivable (re-payment of loans).

This case raises concerns about the charities involved, the accounting firms that audited their financial statements and the Charities Directorate of the Canada Revenue Agency which is supposed to oversee the charitable sector and enforce the law.

In my view, the charities involved are an alarming example of the maneuvers that registered charities can conduct, enabled by fancy accounting practices and the CRA’s lax enforcement. The Burnaby sports centre and the foreclosure of Quest University Canada are examples, in my opinion, of just how badly Canadian charities can operate and yet still not be shut down by CRA.

To deter wash transactions and other shenanigans, The Income Tax should be amended to require substantially more transparency with regards to tax-receipted donations and the CRA’s process for auditing charities. Furthermore, accounting firms should be more accountable for the transactions that they legitimize by providing audited financial statements. Requirements for greater transparency and accountability would significantly reduce the temptation to finagle unwarranted tax relief via registered charities.

In letters to Scott Cousens, I urged him to tell me if I have presented anything that is factually inaccurate or if I missed any important points. Instead of providing answers to my questions - which are a legitimate matter of public interest - Mr. Cousens sued me for defamation. After a year of correspondence with his legal counsel, I have asked the court to dismiss Mr. Cousens' claim against me.

The Exhibits that accompany my affidavit, a total of 644 pages, are provided below.

Posted at 01:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CHIMP Hits $1 BILLION in Donations: Let's look a bit closer ...

Charitable Impact Foundation, a Vancouver based charity known as "CHIMP," recently announced, on April 26, 2022, that it has received more than $1 billion in donations since it began a decade ago. Two weeks later, by May 11, CHIMP's running total was up by another $100 million to $1.1 billion.

The main service that CHIMP provides is an online portal that allows donations to be made to any of the 86,000 charities in Canada. Anyone can set up an “Impact Account” which CHIMP says is like an online bank account for charitable giving. CHIMP reports that 167,000 people have used its service to donate to 12,000 charities.

If CHIMP truly has received $1.1 billion in charitable giving, that's wonderful news! But troubling facts in the history of this charity suggest to me that it should be thoroughly audited by the Canada Revenue Agency. Ahead, I'll explain my concerns, opinions and some of the questions that I believe need to be answered. Over the past four years, I've raised all of my questions with Blake Bromley and John Bromley in a long series of letters. Initially, they did reply but most of my questions have gone unanswered.

GONE BANANAS

CHIMP calls itself the “fastest-growing giving network and donor-advised fund in Canada.”

Tax-receipted gifts reported by CHIMP have gone bananas, soaring to $151 million last year, up by one hundred-fold since CHIMP began. Tax-receipted donations in CHIMP's first year were only $149 916, back in 2011.

CHIMP reports spending virtually nothing on fundraising, only $19,222 over a decade. So how did CHIMP grow so big so fast? This is now a billion-dollar question.

In 2018, The Globe & Mail reported that CHIMP's wealthy donors get tax-receipts for their donations - and their money back. That reporting was based in part on some of my research.

CHIMP first caught my eye because of the peculiar names of some of the charities that it has funded, such as the Maple Syrup Mafia Foundation which got $1.7 million from CHIMP. Another reason that I have followed CHIMP is because it funds an environmental charity that I have followed for many years. In 2021 alone, this charity received $1.7 million from CHIMP.

Year after year, I have followed CHIMP’s financial activity by reviewing its tax returns and financial statements.

One of the things that I noticed is that some of CHIMP's gifts seem to go in circles and boomerang back to CHIMP. Here's an example: In 2020, CHIMP made a gift of $1.025 million to Steward's Charitable Foundation ("SCF"). That same year, SCF gifted $1 million back to CHIMP. Worth noting is that the gift to SCF was non-cash and the gift back to CHIMP was cash, according to tax returns. Non-cash gifts could be securities, cryptocurrency, real estate, a promissory note, and so on.

An important point to note is that both CHIMP and SCF were originally under the direction of Blake Bromley (see here and here), a retired Vancouver lawyer who specializes in charity and tax planning.

The Bromley Charities

According to CHIMP, Blake Bromley has registered more than 650 charities that have handled $2 billion in gifts. So far, I have identified about 200 of these charities. I refer to them as "The Bromley Charities" because they use the address of Bromley's former company (Benefic Group Inc.) and because most of the directors are or were Bromley's employees. As such, most of these charities appear to me to have little outside, independent oversight.

From my detailed research, I have found that by dollar value, most of the gifts that the Bromley Charities give are to each other. By my analysis, 35 of the Bromley Charities, not including CHIMP, made gifts for a combined total of more than $300 million (2015-2021) but less than $2 million went to outside charities that are not part of the Bromley network. This suggests to me that the Bromley charities are part of a common operation, like multiple pockets in the same pair of pants.

CHIMP is run by Blake Bromley’s sons, John and Clif.

When I first wrote to Blake Bromley and John Bromley in 2018, I asked about why some of their charities make gifts back and forth to each other. Their letters of reply indicated that the they took great offence at my questions and insisted that their charities follow the law. "Chimp Foundation has consistently operated in compliance with all statutory and regulatory requirements," John Bromley wrote.

Flagged by Deloitte: $193 Million in Unlisted Securities

An important point to note is that by dollar value, the vast majority of the gifts for which CHIMP has issued tax receipts are non-cash. In fact, last year non-cash accounted for 84 percent of CHIMP’s tax-receipted donations, a total of $128 million in just one year, CHIMP's tax return says.

Non-cash gifts to CHIMP are a concern because CHIMP's Independent Auditor, Deloitte, warned in 2020 that it could not vouch for $193 million of CHIMP's assets in the form of unlisted securities. Deloitte warned that it was "unable to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence supporting the carrying amount of investments in certain unlisted securities with a total carrying value of $193,037,460 as of July 31, 2020."

By my analysis of the gifts to CHIMP during the years preceding Deloitte’s audit, the total amount of the large, mostly non-cash, round-numbered gifts that CHIMP received from various Bromley Charities was $192 827 970. That’s very close to the value of the unlisted securities that Deloitte was unable to vouch for. Perhaps that’s just a coincidence. Whatever the reason, the fact that $193 million of CHIMP’s assets are in doubt is concerning.

Loans and Notes Receivable

Another thing I notice is that most of the large gifts between the Bromley Charities are mortgage loans, land, promissory notes and notes receivable. Timothy Foundation, for example, reports seven notes receivable (loans) which account for 80 percent of its assets.

Here's a recent example: In 2021, CHIMP made a gift of $4 million to Plentiville Foundation.

Financial statements for Plentiville Foundation clearly show that it used the $4 million from CHIMP to make a loan for $3.875 million at an interest rate of approximately 8 percent. The sole directors of Plentiville Foundation are Blake Bromley, John Bromley and another member of the Bromley family. This means that when CHIMP gifted $4 million to Plentiville, CHIMP gifted the money from one charity directed by John Bromley to another charity that was also directed by CHIMP's CEO and his immediate family. This raises a series of questions. For starters, why is CHIMP's $4 million gift not recorded as a gift to an associated charity?

The $74.7 Million Gift

By my analysis of CHIMP's tax returns, the largest gift that CHIMP has ever made was a gift of $74.7 million to Fortius Foundation, a charity that owned a large sports centre until it was sold to the City of Burnaby for $25.6 million. Fortius Foundation is also one of The Bromley Charities, originally registered by John Bromley and others. This means that the $74.7 million gift went from one of the Bromley Charities to another.

According to information provided by the Canada Revenue Agency, CHIMP's $74.7 million gift is the largest gift to a non-governmental organization in the history of British Columbia.

In financial statements, Fortius Foundation acknowledges that it received CHIMP's massive gift and yet the board of directors expressed "significant doubt" about the charity's ability to continue as a going concern. This raises a troubling question: Why did CHIMP give $74.7 million to a charity that didn't have a sound investment strategy for its huge, historic gift?

CHIMP says in its financial statements that the $74.7 million was to restructure and reduce Fortius Foundation's debt. This prompted me to figure out why Fortius Foundation got into such deep debt in the first place and to whom the money was owed.

My detailed research based on tax returns and financial statements reveals that the $74.7 million from CHIMP was used to pay debts to five of The Bromley Charities. These same charities then made gifts to CHIMP for a total of $76.5 million. Put plainly, the ultimate beneficiary of CHIMP's $74.7 million gift was CHIMP itself.

The five Bromley Charities that made loans to Fortius Foundation and gifts to CHIMP were Almoner Foundation, Imladris Foundation, Foundation for Public Good, Homestead on the Hill Foundation and Association for the Advancement of Scholarship. Financial statements for these charities show that their gifts to CHIMP weren't cash, they were notes receivable.

Quest University Canada

Something similar happened with Quest University Canada (“Quest”), a private university in Squamish, B.C. Quest took several loans from the Bromley Charities which were consolidated into a mortgage loan held by CHIMP. In 2018, CHIMP transferred the mortgage loan to another one of The Bromley Charities, Vanchorverve Foundation, as a gift of $20.7 million.

When Quest’s loan came due and the university was unable to pay, it was forced into foreclosure to pay the debt to Vanchorverve. After the university was sold, Vanchorverve paid $24.5 million to CHIMP. The university lost ownership of all its land and buildings and is now reduced to leasing back its premises from its new owner.

Chimp Technology Inc. Paid $54 Million

Another concern that I have is that financial statements for CHIMP, which I obtained from CRA, show that it has paid more than $54 million (2011-2021) to Chimp Technology Inc., a private company that provides technology services and human resources to CHIMP. More than $50 million was paid over the past five years, including $13.6 million in 2021.

Chimp Technology Inc. is a private company run by the charity's CEO, John Bromley, and his father, Blake Bromley. To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with a charity paying a family-run company as long as the payment to a related party is disclosed and the services are provided at fair market value.

But there is a troubling question that needs to be answered about CHIMP's payments to Chimp Technology Inc.

CHIMP says at its website that its service is "free." "Charitable Impact doesn't charge sign-up or transaction fees for Impact Accounts," CHIMP says. On donor-advised funds, CHIMP charges 0.5 percent on the first $1 million and 0.25 percent after that. Even if CHIMP charged 0.5 percent on the entire $1 billion that it has received, that's only $5 million. So where did CHIMP, the registered charity, get the $54 million that it has paid to Chimp Technology Inc.?

Board Resignations

Here's another question: Why did CHIMP's entire board resign in 2020? And why doesn't CHIMP post its audited financial statements at its website?

These are fair questions.

Posted at 03:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Liberal Party, Josh Vander Vies, CHIMP & The Bromley Charities

Integrity is on the minds of many voters as we head to the polls for Canada’s 44^th election. This is partly because three times, the Ethics Commissioner has found that Justin Trudeau broke the rules, and because the early media coverage of Jody Wilson-Raybould’s new book, released this week, has stoked our disgust with bad behaviour.

Both the Liberals and the Conservatives have recently dropped candidates due to incidents that were missed in their initial vetting. The Liberals lost Raj Saini over allegations of sexual harassment and the Conservatives turfed Lisa Robinson for a 2017 tweet that said, "Muslims go home."

In the spirit of transparency promised by the Liberals, voters deserve the full story about one of their candidates in Vancouver, Josh Vander Vies, and CHIMP, a registered charity engaged in complex charitable giving arrangements that are the focus of an RCMP file.

Last week, Justin Trudeau tweeted a shout-out to Vander Vies. “Can’t wait to welcome you to Ottawa, Josh!” Katie Telford, Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister, also chimed in. Evidently, Vander Vies has the Liberal’s endorsement at the highest level.

As Josh puts it, he was born without arms, legs or limits. To his credit, he became a Paralympic athlete, winning bronze in boccia. Vander Vies is also a lawyer, he’s in-house legal counsel to CHIMP. Josh has been with CHIMP since 2012 when it set up a fund for his boccia training and travel.

Vander Vies’ job at CHIMP is relevant to his pursuit of public office because CHIMP’s finances are under significant scrutiny.

In 2018, The Globe and Mail published an in-depth investigation which found that wealthy donors get big tax breaks – and their donations back.

For 2020, the Independent Auditor's Report on CHIMP, done by Deloitte, says that the auditors were unable to obtain sufficient audit appropriate evidence to support the carrying value of $193 million in unlisted securities. Why couldn’t Deloitte vouch for $193 million, just last year? Vander Vies and John Bromley, CHIMP's CEO have been asked to explain. So far, no reply.

The fact that Vander Vies is a candidate casts doubt on whether a re-elected Liberal government would take action to address the monkey business that has been going on at CHIMP.

CHIMP was registered as a charity by Blake Bromley, a Vancouver lawyer specialized in charity and tax planning. CHIMP is run by Bromley's sons, John and Clif.

Bromley claims to have registered 650 charities that processed $2 billion in tax-receipted donations. Some of these charities caught my eye because of their unusual names such as Trust Me Foundation and Maple Syrup Mafia Foundation. The latter purports to support missionary work but it has never given a nickel to any organization, its tax returns show.

For five years, I have obtained the tax returns and financial statements from CRA, upon request, and have followed the finances of CHIMP plus 200 charities that use the same address as CHIMP and are directed primarily by Bromley’s employees (“The Bromley Charities”). Except for CHIMP, most have no staff and no public presence, not even a website. To me, these charities seem like units in a large operation, multiple pockets in the same pair of pants.

Christopher Richardson, the Official Agent for Josh Vander Vies was also a director of CHIMP for nine years (2009-2018) has been a director of 40 of The Bromley Charities. Update, Sept. 25, 2022: For an updated list of the charities where Christopher Richardson is/was director, click here.

Since it began in 2011, CHIMP's growth has been astonishing. Tax-receipted donations have soared from less than $150,000 to nearly $150 million (2011 to 2020). Within the charitable sector, this rate of growth is highly unusual. To put CHIMP’s growth into perspective, consider that CHIMP, a relatively new charity, raised five times as much as Vancouver Foundation which has been the biggest charity in the city for 75 years.[i]

What is also unusual is that more than 80 percent of the donations that were tax-receipted by CHIMP last here were non-cash, the same type of donation that CHIMP’s Independent Auditor was unable to vouch for.

In 2019, CHIMP added "thousands more donors" and funded 3,600 charities, according to its annual report, signed by Josh Vander Vies.

Indeed, CHIMP operates nationwide but its charitable impact is questionable because thousands of CHIMP’s gifts are meaninglessly small. For example, the Missing Children's Society and the Ottawa Rape Crisis Centre were both funded via CHIMP but got less than $5 each. More than 2,000 charities across Canada got $19 or less: 624 charities in Ontario, 426 in Quebec, 550 in British Columbia and 400 charities in other provinces and territories.

The thousands of very tiny gifts create a façade of nationwide benevolence but the reality is that by dollar value, the majority of CHIMP’s “giving” goes to The Bromley Charities and the vast majority of their giving goes back to CHIMP. By my analysis, between 2015 and 2020, The Bromley Charities gave "gifts" for a total of $265 million, but less than $2 million went outside the Bromley network. Fully $178 million went to CHIMP.

For a gift to be a true gift, there needs to be an intention on behalf of a donor to benefit the recipient, with a corresponding impoverishment to the donor. Furthermore, there must be a true transfer of property without expectation of something in return. In the case of the many of the gifts between The Bromley Charities and CHIMP, I question how these criteria are met. Many of the “gifts” between The Bromley Charities are promissory notes, loans, mortgages and software license agreements that are transferred from one charity to the next.

For example, a software license agreement for $1,845,000 was gifted between CHIMP and four of The Bromley Charities, passed from one to the next and then entirely written off. In addition to being CHIMP’s lawyer, Josh Vander Vies was also a director of one of these charities, Real Champions Foundation

One of the largest gifts made by CHIMP was $74.7 million gifted to Fortius Foundation, one of The Bromley Charities. Years ago, Fortius Foundation built a sports centre in Burnaby, B.C. and owned it until the centre was sold for $26.6 million to the City of Burnaby, ostensibly due to financial troubles that began long before COVID.

The assessed value of the buildings that comprise the sports centre is $15.7 million so it seems odd that despite CHIMP’s huge gift just two years ago, the sports centre needed a substantial bail-out from Burnaby taxpayers.

Corporate records for CHIMP, signed by Josh Vander Vies, show that last year, CHIMP’s entire board resigned and was replaced.

Concerned that there might be some monkey business going on at CHIMP, I provided information to the Economic Crime Unit at the Burnaby RCMP, in January. They opened a file. Last week, I was told that the RCMP has completed a report. Whether any wrongdoing was found, and whether a full investigation will be commenced, I haven’t been told. RCMP should act on their report, especially now that someone from CHIMP seeks to be a Member of Parliament.

Overall, I see how The Bromley Charities benefit each other and how CHIMP benefits the CEO's private company, as I'll explain ahead, but I do not see that The Bromley Charities operate for purposes that are exclusively charitable - which is what the law requires.

Tax planning is legitimate. The right of taxpayers to minimize their tax payable is enshrined in The Income Tax Act but it has too many loopholes and grey zones that allow charities to issue tax receipts that far exceed the true value of a gift, especially for non-cash gifts of unlisted securities. There used to be an unwritten rule that diddling charities was off-limits. Those days are gone.

As our country wobbles towards economic recovery, we can’t continue to allow tax shenanigans made possible by lax laws and scant oversight.

Since Justin Trudeau became Prime Minister, the charity audits completed by the CRA have fallen from 845 to 279 per year between 2014 and 2019, CRA says.

Mark Blumberg, a Toronto lawyer specialized in charity, has made recommendations to improve CRA oversight and protect the public trust in charities. The Blumberg Recommendations were part of the 2021 budget process but were not implemented.

Blumberg recommended specific amendments to Section 241 of the Income Tax Act:

1) Increase minimum amount a charity is required to spend each year,

2) Allow CRA to disclose serious non-compliance, and

3) Create a unit within the RCMP, or other police force, to review complicated, abusive charity schemes that provide inappropriate donation receipts or undue benefits.

Other recommendations were also made.

The next federal government should put The Blumberg Recommendations into law.

To continue reading, click here.

Posted at 11:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Josh Vander Vies, Liberal Party (federal), Candidate for Vancouver East and ..... The Bromley Charities PART 2

Two of the major projects of The Bromley Charities are Quest University Canada (“Quest”) in Squamish, B.C., and Fortius Sport & Health Centre (“The Sports Centre”) in Burnaby, B.C. CHIMP was heavily involved in both. For example, in 2018 CHIMP gave a gift of $74.7 million to Fortius Foundation which funded the construction of The Sports Centre.

Despite more than half a billion ($525 million and $106 million) in tax-receipted donations and gifts reported by The Bromley Charities that funded the start-up of Quest and The Sports Centre, both have faltered and were sold last year.

In January of 2020, Quest was forced into creditor protection and sold to repay a loan secured by a $30 million mortgage against Quest's land. The mortgage was held by CHIMP and then "gifted" to another Bromley Charity, Vanchorveuve Foundation. When Quest failed to repay the loan, Bromley initiated foreclosure proceedings. Of the $46 million from Quest’s sale, $25.2 million (Pwc Report) was paid to Vanchorverve. Likewise, the sale of The Sport Centre resulted in payment of $26.6 million to Fortius Foundation from the City of Burnaby. Thus, the sale of Quest and Fortius resulted in payments of $51.8 million to The Bromley Charities.

One of The Bromley Charities, Foundation For Public Good, made large loans to both Quest and Fortius Foundation, financial statements show. In the process, Foundation For Public Good collected $4 million as interest and made “gifts” for a total of $57 million to The Bromley Charities, including $34 million to CHIMP. But not one dollar was given to organizations that are outside the Bromley network.

Over the same years that Quest and The Sports Centre were forced to close, CHIMP paid $40 million (2014-2020) to Chimp Technology Inc., a private company run by John Bromley, Blake Bromley's son, to provide human resources and technology services to CHIMP. In 2018 alone, CHIMP Foundation paid $12.7 million to the John Bromley's company. That same year, Quest had to shut down its varsity sports program for lack of $300,000 or $400,000 to keep the teams playing.

Since it began, CHIMP received $775 million in donations, it says. That includes $150 million in 2020 alone. With all that money, why couldn't CHIMP save Quest nor The Sports Centre?

Financial statements show that some of the large "gifts" between The Bromley Charities were actually loans, not gifts. In one case, Timothy Foundation, reports seven loans receivable from other Bromley Charities. As of 2020, these loans account for 80 percent of total assets. Evidently, making loans is a large part of what this charity does.

Fortius Foundation advertised that it funded the construction of The Sports Centre with a gift of $23 million, calling it "the largest philanthropic gift in Canadian sports history." But the financial statements for Fortius Foundation clearly show that it began with a loan for $17 million from a related party, not a gift of $23 million.

Two of the main problems that I see with The Bromley Charities are:

Some of the large tax-receipted “donations” reported by The Bromley Charities appear to have been loans, not true gifts. For example, financial statements for Fortius Foundation clearly show that the $23 million “gift” reportedly made by Scott Cousens to fund the start-up of Fortius Sport & Health Centre, or a large portion of that “gift,” was actually a loan (more here). Mr. Cousens says he made a $23 million donation, calling it "largest philanthropic gift in Canadian Sports History" but provides no evidence that he actually made that gift. As an example of the lending between The Bromley Charities, consider Timothy Foundation; 80 percent its total assets are accounted for by seven loans and interest receivable on loans to other Bromley Charities.
Very large tax-receipted donations have been written off. For example, consider the Stewart & Marilyn Blusson Foundation. Stewart Blusson is said to have donated $100 million to start Quest. The year Quest opened, Blusson Foundation reported $10 535 900 in tax-receipted donations and wrote off precisely the same amount that very same year. A few years later, the same foundation wrote off $119 million and then a further $75 million.

In my opinion, many of The Bromley Charities are "charities" in name only. I'll cite two examples:

Angel Philanthropy Foundation – This charity began in 2007. For more than ten years, it was inactive. In 2019, it sprung to life with a tax-receipted donation of $6.4 million. But one year later, none of that remains. Financial statements show that $2.9 million was written off, $20,727 was paid as fees and $3.5 million was gifted to CHIMP. As of 2020, Angel Philanthropy reported zero dollars. Its only asset is $500 as GST receivable.
Viva Voce Charitable Foundation – Registered by employees of Blake Bromley, Viva Voce has had revenues of $40 million of which $35 million was gifts from CHIMP. Viva Voce used most of that money to buy life insurance policies. The only charity that Viva Voce has ever funded is CHIMP, which received a non-cash gift of nearly $1.8 million in 2020.

Over the past five years, I have written a long series of detailed letters to Blake Bromley, John Bromley and Scott Cousens in order to share my concerns and ask legitimate questions. Blake and John Bromley have both replied but did not answer my questions. In the absence of answers from them, I wrote to CRA to request a proper audit of CHIMP and a full investigation of The Bromley Charities as a whole. Indeed, CRA has already shut down at least eight of The Bromley Charities but the CRA audits take far too long. The audit of Theanon Foundation and the transactions that it covered had a span of 19 years.

Questions for Josh Vander Vies

Given that Josh Vander Vies, the lawyer who is currently the in-house counsel for CHIMP, is seeking public office, he should answer questions about the charity with which he has been involved for nearly ten years. Specifically:

What is Mr. Vander Vies’ response to the Independent Auditor's Report prepared by Deloitte, which states that the accountants were unable to vouch for $193 million of CHIMP’s unlisted securities?
Why did CHIMP’s entire board resign in the spring of 2020? Was Mr. Vander Vies involved in any of the activities that led to the resignation of the entire board?
- CHIMP Corporate Records Signed by Josh Vander Vies (2 pages)
What was Mr. Vander Vies’ role at CHIMP in 2018, when CHIMP made a “gift” of $74,711,535 to Fortius Foundation? Was he CHIMP’s in-house legal counsel at that time?
Will Mr. Vander Vies ensure that CHIMP posts the financial statements at its website for the two most recent years?
What was the software license agreement for $1,845,000 that Real Champions Foundation reported when Mr. Vander Vies was on its board of directors in 2015? Why was this asset gifted through a daisy chain of five of The Bromley Charities before it was written off entirely by Mighty Oaks Foundation?
Why is there no mention of Mr. Vander Vies’ involvement with CHIMP in the biography for him that is posted at the website of The Liberal Party of Canada?
Is CHIMP currently under CRA audit?

Posted at 08:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Canadian Press Apology to Vivian Krause

On May 28, 2021, Canadian Press published a story under the headline, "'No evidence:' Researcher Behind 'Anti-Alberta' Inquiry Backs Off Assertion. The headline of that story was entirely untrue and the body of the article contained serious inaccuracies.

Canadian Press has apologized without reservation.

For the letter of apology, click here.

Posted at 03:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Deloitte "Unable to Obtain Sufficient Appropriate Audit Evidence..." $193,037,460

If you've been reading this blog, you'll know that I've been concerned for several years now about the monkey business at the CHIMP Foundation. Turns out, I'm not the only one. In CHIMP's financial statements for 2020, Deloitte issued a Basis for Qualified Opinion.

Deloitte was "unable to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence supporting the carrying amount of investments in certain unlisted securities with a total carrying value of $193,037,460 as of July 31, 2020."

I can't help but wonder if this is part of the reason why CHIIMP's entire board resigned and was replaced in late February/early March of 2020.

CHIMP does not provide its 2020 financials at its website so I obtained them from CRA.

To read the redacted statements that were provided to me by CRA, click here.

Posted at 09:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Bromley Charities: Tax Returns, Applications for Registration and Financial Statements

Applications for Registration

Charities registered by Blake Bromley & others:

4 What Matters Foundation
Abundance Institute (Christopher Richardson)
Almoner Foundation (Christopher Richardson)
Arcadia Foundation (Leslie Brandlmayr)
Association for the Advancement of Scholarship (Greg Kerfoot)
Canadian Football Federation
Glen Lamond Foundation
Global Charity Fund
Harmony Foundation (Christopher Richardson)
HSEF Rennaisance Academy
Imladris Foundation (Leslie Brandlmayr)
Independent World Television
Institute for Freedom & Justice (John Weston)
Koinonikos Foundation
Loyalty Foundation (Leslie Brandlmayr)
Mighty Oaks Foundation (Leslie Brandlmayr)
Noble Spirit Foundation
Prescient Foundation
R & M Eynhallow Foundation
Real Champions Foundation
Revelation Foundation (Christopher Richardson)
Rosewood Charitable Foundation (Leslie Brandlmayr)
Samaritan Children's Charitable Foundation
Sea to Sky Academy
Sea to Sky Foundation
Stewart & Marilyn Blusson Foundation
Theanon Foundation
Timothy Foundation
Trust Me Foundation
Virtual Vancouver Foundation (Christopher Richardson)

Charities registered by John Bromley & others:

Charities registered by Leslie Brandlmayr & others:

Delicate Balance Foundation (Victoria Nalugwa)
Harbour Lights Foundation Grant Brandlmayr & Jeremy Brandlmayr)
Headwaters Foundation
Pacific Spine Foundation (Victoria Nalugwa)
Paraklesis Foundation (Alex Salas-Sanchez)
Plentiville Foundation (Victoria Nalugwa)
QUC Residents Housing Foundation
Vanchorverve (Paradigm) Foundation
Viva Voce Charitable Foundation

Other applications:

C & R Foundation
Canadian Education Forum
Canadian Urban Planning Foundation
Charitable Impact Foundation ("CHIMP")
Doing Good Foundation
Eden Glen Foundation
Foundation For Public Good
Global View Foundation (Alex Salas-Sanchez)
Howe Sound Samaritans Foundation
Pacific Light Foundation (Alex Salas-Sanchez)
Planted Community Foundation
Quest University Canada Foundation
Rise & Shine (Spectrum Diversity) Foundation
Seacrest Foundation
Steward's Charitable Foundation
Thalia (Pratt-Johnson) Foundation
Zawadi Foundation (Alex Salas-Sanchez)

Financial Statements:

CHIMP: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
4 What Matters Foundation: 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014.
Almoner Foundation: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 2, 2022.
Association for the Advancement of Scholarship: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Canadian Football Federation: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010.
Delicate Balance Foundation: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Eden Glen Foundation: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Fortius Foundation: 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Foundation for Public Good: 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021. NOTE: CRA did not provide financial statements for 2012.
Glen Lamond Foundation: 2012, 2013, 2014.
Global Charity Fund: 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013.
Headwaters Foundation: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Homestead on the Hill Foundation: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020, NOTE: CRA did not provide financial statements for 2017 nor 2021.
Howe Sound Samaritans Foundation: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016,
Hope Springs Eternal Foundation: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Imladris Foundation: 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 NOTE: CRA did not provide financial statements for 2012 & 2013.
Mighty Oaks Foundation: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Pacific Light Foundation: 2012, 2013, 2014.
Pacific Spine Research Foundation: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018.
Philanthropy Without Frontiers: 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014.
Planted Community Foundation: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Plentiville Foundation: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Quest University Canada Foundation: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 MISSING 2014, 2015.
Real Champions Foundation: 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 2014, 2015
Revelation Foundation: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Sea to Sky Foundation: 2003, 2004, 2005a, 2005b, MISSING 2006 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012. Sea to Sky Foundation Tax Return (2006)
Stewart & Marilyn Blusson Foundation: 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Timothy Foundation: 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Vanchorverve Foundation: 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Virtual Vancouver: 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021.
Viva Voce Charitable Foundation: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.
Zawadi Foundation: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020.

Tax Returns:

Certificates of Change of Name

Posted at 09:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

House of Commons & Senate of Canada Vivian Krause Testimony (2010-2020)

Posted at 06:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Letters to Blake Bromley, John Bromley & Scott Cousens

Canadian Football Federation (90 pages)

Posted at 09:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To Mayor Mike Hurley & The Burnaby City Council RE: Fortius Sports Centre

January 29, 2021

Dear Mayor Hurley & Council,

As we know, just before Christmas, The City of Burnaby announced plans to buy Fortius Sport & Health Centre for $26.6 million. The sale is scheduled to close very soon, on Monday, February 1, 2021.

As I said in my initial letter, two weeks ago, I hope that the sports centre can re-open as soon as possible but I believe that the payment of $26.6 million to Fortius Foundation should be put on hold.

Based on what I'll explain ahead, it seems to me that in purchasing the sports centre, The City of Burnaby faces three issues: 1) The price, 2) Who gets the money, 3) The RCMP file.

Regarding the price, Mayor Hurley has told me that he thinks The City is getting a bargain. The centre is 140,000 square feet and would cost $1,000 per square foot to build, he says. ($1,000 - seems awfully high to me, but that's what the mayor said). At $1,000, that would put the replacement cost at about $140 million. Its easy to see why Council would keen to buy the sports centre for less than a quarter of that but there's more to this purchase than the price.

The current owner of the sports centre is Fortius Foundation, a registered charity.

Promising to help Canadian athletes raise their game, Fortius Foundation opened the sports centre in 2013. Since then, Fortius has hosted an impressive number of teams and events - even pre-season training for the Toronto Raptors.

At the end of December, Fortius Foundation shut down the sports centre, blaming COVID19. But the truth is that Fortius has been in trouble for years.

The $23 Million “Donation” from Scott Cousens

Fortius has long said that it began with a $23 million donation from Scott Cousens, a local mining executive. However, as The Globe and Mail reported with an in-depth investigation by Kathy Tomlinson, this narrative is contradicted by tax returns and financial statements obtained from the Canada Revenue Agency.

Tax returns show that gifts to Fortius from Scott Cousens’ private foundation total $130,000, not $23 million.

Despite a total of $106 million in tax-receipted donations and charitable gifts, Fortius Foundation was still $24 million in debt (as of 2019), and yet the assessed value of the buildings is only $15.7 million. The $106 million includes a "gift" of $74.7 million from Charitable Impact Foundation (“CHIMP”), just two years ago.

In addition to the $106 million in gifts, Fortius Foundation also undertook a total of $130 million in loans. Much of the $130 million appears to have been a refinancing of the original loans, which appear to have been refinanced several times.

As I mentioned in my initial letter, during December I asked Scott Cousens repeatedly about the funding of the sports centre via e-mail, phone and Twitter. I sent a detailed letter sent to him and to John Bromley, CEO of CHIMP. I received no reply so I reported this matter to The Economic Crime Unit of The Burnaby RCMP. They have opened a file (#2021-892).

Fortius Foundation

The second, more difficult issue is who should get the $26.6 million. The salient point here is that Fortius Foundation is not a commercial seller. It is a registered charity.

As I explained in my initial letter, on the basis of my extensive research it is clear to me that Fortius Foundation is part of a massive tax fraud scam involving hundreds of millions of dollars in tax-receipted donations and charitable gifts that are a SHAM. For examples of tax-receipted donations and gifts that I believe are a sham, click here.

The reason that I would characterize these gifts as a sham is because I believe that no real money changed hands. For a gift to be a true gift, there must be an intention on behalf of a donor to benefit the recipient, with a corresponding impoverishment to the donor. Furthermore, I believe that there was no true transfer of property since these gifts are between related parties and were not made without expectation of something in return. For these reasons, I believe that these gifts are sham transactions, paper shuffles conducted in a circuit of charities that operates like multiple pockets in the same pair of pants.

By law, registered charities are required to operate for purposes that are exclusively charitable. This means entirely, solely and purely charitable. This is the responsibility that charities bear because they can issue tax receipts for substantial tax relief.

The sole purpose of Fortius Foundation was the sports centre. Now that the centre is closed, the foundation should also close because its purpose no longer exists. This is why I believe that The City of Burnaby should not pay as much as $26.6 million to Fortius Foundation.

To see how Fortius got into trouble, we need to look back at how it began.

Tax records show that Fortius was created by a trio of registered charities. The first of the trio, New Dimensions Foundation, reported nearly $18 million in tax-receipted donations (2008 & 2009). That should have been enough to build the sports centre. But instead of using the $18 million for the centre's construction, New Dimensions gave a loan - not a gift - of $17.4 million to the second charity, Fortius Foundation. That loan was secured by a mortgage against the sports centre and was passed on to the third charity, Imladris Foundation.

An important point here is that these three charities are not autonomous. All three were created by Scott Cousens and Blake Bromley, a Vancouver lawyer. This trio must therefore be assessed as a whole. New Dimensions did nothing but receipt the $18 million, hand-off the Fortius loan to Imladris, and promptly shut down. Imladris Foundation is now run solely by Scott Cousens, his spouse and family. CHIMP, which gave Fortius Foundation the "gift" of $74.7 million, is run by Bromley's sons, John and Clif.

Another important point is the date of the loan from New Dimensions to Fortius Foundation. That date is June 1, 2008, before the 2009 financial crisis.

As I reviewed the financial statements for the Fortius charities, one of the surprising things I noticed is that between 2010 and 2018, Scott Cousens’ foundation charged roughly $1 million per year in interest on the loan to Fortius Foundation, a total of $9.6 million. The initial interest rate was 20 percent. That was reduced to 5 per cent pursuant to a CRA audit, tax returns say. The net result of the interest charges, in my view, is that the “donation of debt” was jacked up by $9.6 million.

In 2018, Scott Cousens’ foundation gave CHIMP Foundation a gift of $29 million which appears to be the transfer of the mortgage against the sports centre, and unpaid interest.

Financial statements show that the construction of the sports centre appears to have been paid for via a long series of loans starting in 2011 with $20 million from Romspen Investment Corporation, based in Ontario. That loan was increased to $26.4 million and followed by $35 million in additional loans from five charities run by Blake Bromley:

- Global Charity Fund: $4 million
- Foundation for Public Good: $12.2 million
- Homestead on the Hill Foundation: $4 million
- Almoner Foundation: $15 million
- Association for the Advancement of Scholarship: $600,000.

In 2018, Fortius Foundation appears to have used the $74.7 million that it received from CHIMP in order to consolidate its debt under a loan from Bank of Montreal. As far as I can tell, the $74.7 million wasn't a true gift of real money, it was a paper shuffle, a re-arrangement of loans.

Important Questions

The most recent publicly available financial statements, for the year 2019, say that Fortius Foundation has a mortgage for $16 million from an unidentified lender (the name is redacted in financial statements provided by the CRA) and a debt of $4 million to a director of the foundation.

Who is the unidentified lender and who is the director owed $4 million? Would they be repaid with public funds?

A list of further questions was included with my initial letter.

Conclusion

In light of the above, I respectfully suggest that The City of Burnaby finds out how much real money was put into building the sports centre - and by who - and I suggest that The City repay the outstanding loans for the cost of the centre's original construction – and not a cent more.

As for the land, the centre is located on 5.2 acres in Burnaby. It was valued at $3 million when the project began. Now, the assessed value is $12.4 million. There’s nothing to stop Fortius Foundation from giving the land to The City of Burnaby at the original cost. After all, giving is what charities are supposed to do.

I wish you the very best in your service of the people and the taxpayers of Burnaby.

I am available to answer any questions you may have.

Sincerely,

Vivian

Posted at 04:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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To Mayor Mike Hurley & The Burnaby City Council RE: Fortius Sports Centre

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