<p>Make your own “a gift has been made in your honor” cards if you don’t want the honoree to get stuck with junk mail. We did that last year when friends requested donations to a specific charity rather than other wedding gifts.</p>
<p>If you set up a donor advised account at one of the brokerages, your name remains anonymous unless you choose to disclose it and you don’t get junk mail. At Fidelity, you can also give the person a giving certificate in a set amount and allow them to designate what 501c3 charity will receive the funds. You still get the tax deduction (not the person who gets the giving certificate). I’m still thinking about setting up a donor advised fund.</p>
<p>If I didn’t get an actual acknowledgement from the charity (along with the associated junk mail), I’d assume the giver just never got around to making the actual donation. But I wouldn’t really care.</p>
<p>Have gotten some eye-opening reports on our attorney general’s website on the charity section. IN 7/1/2011-6/30/2012, Alzheimer’s Association used professional fundraiser InfoCision and raised $16,000 but only $19 ever got to the charity in HI–0.12%; nationally, 26.4% was kept by the charity! To me it’s outrageous how many professionals are trolling for $$$$ and keeping the lion’s share of it. The information is buried in the AG’s website, so you have to dig a bit to find it. It would be good if this information were easier for folks to view and maybe it should be posted elsewhere as well. Many of the professional fundraisers contribute from 0% to 10% to the charity in HI. It is disgusting to me how they use the name and shield of the charity to line their own pockets!</p>
<p>You may be able to find similar reports on your AG’s website, if you ask. </p>
<p>Here are some numbers that concerned me when I looked at reports of various years.</p>
<p>For 7/1/2014-6l/30/2015, Heifer Project International has MDS Communication Corp raising money for it. About 51.2% of funds collected go to national or Hawaii charities from the funds they collect.</p>
<p>In 7/12011-6/30/2012, Habitat for Humanity used Strategic Fundraising to raise money for them. $226,723 was raised and 100% went to the fundraiser! It also used InfoCision Management Corp and raised $1,626,914.03 and only 8.5% or $139,021.29 went to charity. They used MDS Communications Corp as well and raised $603,095 and 74% or $446,686 went to charity. To me, these numbers are appalling! I’m sure most donors do not expect that 92.5 to 100% of the money they were ostensibly donating to Habitat for Humanity was going to the fundraisers!</p>
<p>Anyway, I do like donating to our public radio station and local arts like our community theater, who seems to be a great steward of it’s funds, as well as organizations I work closely with.</p>
<p>I’m not fond of charitable donations as gifts unless the recipient has requested them. One sibling used to make the minimum donation required to be listed by name (often just $25) on the charity’s website or newsletter, then send copies to friends and relatives exhorting them to follow his example of generosity as he told us that was our Christmas present since we didn’t need anything else.</p>
<p>I like Nottelling’s idea of buying museum memberships if the recipient has expressed an interest in them. When our kids were little, I used to suggest a zoo or children’s museum membership to relatives who typically spent the equivalent on toys.</p>
<p>I prefer to support local charities that provide direct resources, care, or services for needy families or I choose missionary families and I avoid large ‘national’ or ‘global’ organizations that spend a lot of donation $ on grand offices and high salaries (Autism Speaks is one I avoid).</p>
<p>I looked at the AG’s report on public charities for my state and was quite surprised at the findings for some of the charities/organizations that I have supported. What is an acceptable amount for the fundraisers to take? I was really surprised to see that many of the organizations that I’ve supported (not huge amounts–maybe $150-200) hired fundraisers who took anywhere from 30-60% of the funds they raised. Is this typical? </p>
<p>I’m not sure what is typical but to me it is appalling that so much of “fundraising” lines the pockets of the folks that raise the money. I tend not to donate to ANY of the companies that have professional fundraisers, as I do not feel they are good stewards of money. I will study the AGs reports more frequently and will propose some legislation locally on this subject. I see no reason that fundraisers should be able to take 100% and more of what they raise! It seems wrong that they take more than 50% of what they raise as well.</p>
<p>I’m not sure what is the “right” amount, but will definitely be raising it at a meeting with our local senator later today. It’s very upsetting and not enough people know these AG reports exist and what they reveal.</p>
<p>Just an old of caution in relying on Charity Navigator. I’m on the board of our local Girl Scout council. We havent been on top of worrying about our rating, as we know we will be hit by the calculation of administrative expenses. We are a business with $6+ million of revenues and have a CEO, CFO and HR director. All of their salaries are considered adminby Charity Navigator. Does this mean we don’t do good things? No, it’s just how this one organization, who many people hold up as the gold standard, evaluates non-profits. </p>
<p>There was a group of ex-Goldman Sachs folks who set up a different tool that looked at a non-profits mission and how well they served them. (I will look for the link and post it). </p>
<p>That said, I’m into local charities. In NJ we have an amazing Food Bank that services most parts of the state. (Community food bank of nj). They also provide food service training for low income people. They have partnered w all the major grocery chains in the area to accept dented cans and arrange for foods just past expiration dates to be delivered to hyper-local food pantries and soup kitchens for immediate use. </p>
<p>I’d like charities to be required to disclose that the caller is a paid solicitor and what % of the contributions collected by them last year (or for the past 5 years) went to the charity and what % stayed in state. I’d also like this information printed in big font on solicitation materials.</p>
<p>Good idea…kind of like the required nutrition labeling on food.</p>
<p>Happymom…if a wedding couple has already requested charity donations, it is very likely that the wedding couple is already in the charity mailing list.</p>
<p>One year my mother gave money to dh’s lab. (he does cancer research.) The med school took a share for their overhead, but it was really nice for him to get the unexpected gift. Most of the cancer charities seem to be more about awareness (yoohoo pink ribbons) and hardly anything actually goes to research.</p>
<p>Oh I’m sure they are. We ended up going with the write-your-own-note plan because the options offered for addressing the “in honor of” card didn’t cover spouses with who both kept their pre-marriage names. If I’d phoned in the donation, someone could have probably handled it, but it was late at night and we were on the website.</p>
<p>Give to your local Public Library. You can tell them where you want it go (books for reluctant readers, etc.), and they will put every cent to where you ask. Public Libraries do amazing work every day and never, never,never have all the funding they need to meet all the need they have.</p>
<p>Nj2011mom–I don’t know that CN doesn’t take into account the size of the organization when looking at the admins, or the fundraising costs, for that matter. I think they’re pretty savvy about that. (full disclosure, an acquaintance works there, and my impression is that it’s really scrupulously trying to be fair and informative.)</p>