Situations That Qualify for Support

The Fund may invest in conventional worker co-ops, worker-shareholder co-ops and multi-stakeholder co-ops ("coopératives de solidarité"). To receive consideration for assistance, the enterprise must meet the CWCF strategic objective of being a viable market-driven enterprise that can contribute to creating a sustainable local economy and can provide its member-workers with the level of income required to enable their long-term commitment to growing and developing the enterprise.

Proponent Commitments

To receive an investment from the Fund the proponents of the enterprise must agree to:

Incorporate their business as an eligible cooperative with complete or partial worker ownership;

Upon incorporation, join the CWCF as a regular member;

Include in their bylaws the requirement that all employees be given the opportunity to become members, and that a minimum of 75% of permanent employees will be members, within the timeframe set out in the federal Cooperatives Act;

Include in its by-laws that a minimum of 10% of surpluses must be allocated to an indivisible reserve, which will revert to the CWCF's Worker Co-op Fund in the event that the cooperative dissolves;

and In the case of expansions, give all new employees an opportunity to become members, and have a minimum of 75% of them be members, within approximately one year of their hiring.

And further, that the proponents will continue to uphold these commitments for at least the duration of any Worker Co-op Fund investment in their cooperative.