@dansup I know firsthand this is not ideal as it does not give sustained funding, but there are some public funds for this sort of endeavour, mostly in 🇪🇺
See for example https://nlnet.nl/entrust/
I understand you're under 🇨🇦 jurisdiction, but with a 🇪🇺 twist to the proposal, or co-candidates I am confident this could get accepted 🙂
If that's something you'd like to explore, let me know if I can be of help.
And thanks for your work!