BCAC: Book Publishers (Operating Assistance)

Deadline: October 8, 2026 (11:59 p.m. PT)

Program Summary:

Operating Assistance: Book Publishers provides funding to assist the general operations of established, professional B.C.-based, Canadian-owned book publishers committed to developing and promoting Canadian writers through publishing works of literary, artistic, or cultural importance for the general public.

This intake of the Operating Assistance program provides support on a one-year cycle, with the option to renew for a second year depending on BC Arts Council’s available budget.

New this year: Operating Assistance recipients are no longer eligible for the Accelerate program. Determination of the grant amount, including any increases, will take into consideration the previous combined total of the Operating Assistance and Accelerate grants. Applicants that are not successful in Operating Assistance and that are eligible for the Accelerate program may be recommended to receive an Accelerate grant based on this application. Do not submit a separate Accelerate application.

Organizations that are placed on Concerned Status under Council’s Fair Notice Policy may be subject to grant reductions of up to 20%

Grant Amount:

The minimum grant amount is $20,000 for new entrants into the Operating Assistance program. There is no maximum grant amount.

Increases to previous Operating Assistance grant amounts will be based on the outcome of the assessment process. Organizations ranking high may receive small increases while organizations ranking poorly may see decreases.

Eligible Applicants:

Organizations not currently receiving Operating Assistance must talk with a Program Advisor to discuss your eligibility and intention to apply. Applications from organizations that do not meet the eligibility criteria will not be forwarded for assessment.

Important considerations before you apply to Operating Assistance

In addition to the eligibility criteria outlined below, organizations should have stability in current operations, both administratively and financially, before they consider applying. Stability would be demonstrated through:

• Having at least one staff person (part-time or full-time) that maintains consistency in operations and programming.
• Ongoing and diverse sources of revenues outside of BC Arts Council funding.
• Ability to plan programming and activities up to two years into the future. For example, in the application, you will be expected to report out on this current fiscal year’s activities as well as your next two projected fiscal years.
  and
• The capacity to compile annual financial information and enter and update this information in the CADAC system and application as outlined below.

BC Arts Council Operating Assistance recipients are not eligible to apply to any of the discipline-specific Project Assistance grant programs or the Accelerate program.

To be eligible, a new applicant to Operating Assistance: Book Publishers must:

• have received at least three grants from the BC Arts Council since April 1, 2022, one of which was an Operating Assistance or a Project Assistance: Literary Arts grant. (Project Assistance: Community Arts Festivals is excluded from the list of grants that meet the three-grant requirement).

To be eligible, a Book Publisher must be:

• A professional book publisher based and registered and in good standing in B.C. as a non-profit society for at least one year;

OR

• A B.C.-based, Canadian-owned book publisher that is a legally registered company in B.C.;

OR

• A book publisher led by an Indigenous (First Nations, Métis, Inuit) community organization or Indigenous government in B.C., for at least one fiscal year prior to application, with a community-based board of management that sets editorial policies;

OR

• A professional book publisher operated by an accredited post-secondary institution in B.C. with an independent advisory board that sets editorial and other policies for programs and services undertaken;

AND

• Engage skilled artistic, curatorial, editorial, and administrative leadership for program or service delivery;
• Fairly compensate artists, arts and culture practitioners, technicians, Elders, and Knowledge Keepers. Compensation must align with community contexts or relevant industry standards within the field of practice;
• Have its head office, general office, editorial office, general operations, and management based in B.C. for at least one fiscal year prior to application;
• In the case of legally registered companies, be managed and financially controlled by B.C. residents who own at least 75% of the company;
• Have operated in B.C. for a minimum of one year with book publishing as the primary (and not peripheral or occasional) business, with the publication of original titles as the focus;
• Maintain full control of the editorial process and have editorial independence from any other company. Where affiliations exist, publishers must be able to demonstrate separate editorial departments, budgets, and financial statements for each book publishing operation;
• Have at least four eligible titles in print, have published at least two eligible titles in the previous year, and be committed to an ongoing program of publishing eligible titles;
• Issue royalty statements on a regular basis and fulfill all contractual obligations to writers, illustrators, translators, and other copyright licensors. Publishers owing payments as of the submission deadline may not be eligible for funding;
• Follow international intellectual property rights standards and cultural ownership protocols;
• Follow the Criminal Records Review Act which requires that people who work with or may have unsupervised access to children or vulnerable adults must undergo a criminal record check by the Criminal Records Review Program;
• Not have any overdue final reports on previous BC Arts Council grants.

An eligible book must:

• Be an original work or first edition (no reprints) in cloth, paper, or digital format;
• Be a work of literary, artistic, or cultural importance in the genres of fiction; poetry; drama; literary and arts criticism; autobiography, biography, memoir, essays; comics and graphic novels; works for children and young adults; and creative and literary works of history, politics, social issues, science, travel, etc.;
• Be written and/or illustrated by Canadian citizens or permanent residents of Canada;
• Contain at least 50% Canadian-authored or -illustrated content;
• Be published for a trade market and be accessible to a general reading audience and not exclusively intended for a specialized audience, including academic or professional;
• Have a contract with the author and/or illustrator for an industry-standard royalty agreement or fee in lieu of royalties;
• Include primarily original material or make a significant contribution to arts and culture with previously sourced material;
• Have content that is entirely within the publisher’s editorial control and not under the control of another financial stakeholder;
• Be a minimum of 80 printed pages, or in the case of illustrated children’s books, a minimum of 24 pages;
• Be free of advertising other than for the publisher’s or author’s own material;
• Have a print run of more than 350 copies; and
• For Canadian-authored works translated into English, French, or Indigenous languages, in addition to the criteria above, the translator must be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident of Canada.