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Man donates food for food drive
By Kaz on Tue, 11/09/2010 - 1:33pm
I have a new "game" I'm playing at work. Each day when I go out to buy lunch at the local Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, I'm buying one extra item.
My office building, like many others, is participating in a food drive for Thanksgiving in support of the East End House effort to hand out turkeys with all of the fixings this holiday season to people in need.
If I made my own lunch, I could probably rustle up something each day extra to put in my bag. But since I don't bring lunch, then those days when I get something at the store (instead of a take-out joint), I'm picking up a box of stuffing, or some instant potatoes, or maybe some powdered milk. It's only a few bucks each lunch that I'm less likely to notice and goes to a good cause.
Like the lottery says, "you have to play to win". Of course, the odds in my game are better. Every player's a winner.
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Comments
Good job, Kaz! East End House also takes paypal
if you're too lazy to leave your desk, even for food. Also donations of goods and stock, and they always need volunteers too. http://www.eastendhouse.org/get-involved Unrestricted funds are always popular with do-gooding organizations!
You're really better off
You're really better off donating food or your time/labor to a local organization.
Unrestricted cash has a way of supporting deadwood at charity organizations rather than their core mission. It's REALLY IMPORTANT to check what percentage of your donation goes to the core mission. If 90 cents of every dollar are going into 'administration' your donations are really creating a cushy job for some cocktail party asshole (whom will brag about their really non-existent do-gooding), or their kids, rather than really helping the needy.
I don't know the particulars
I don't know the particulars of this organization, but most of what you describe doesn't exist. There are paid fundraisers, which are for profit outfits that do indeed take an excessively large cut. But if you donate directly to a registered charity, the ratio is typically closer to 10% for fund raising, 90% for program. Personally, I'm a big proponent of unrestricted donations because most funding comes with a lot of strings, leaving very little for necessary administrative functions. By all means, people should check out a charity before giving (guidestar.org is a good place to start) but don't categorically reject the notion of unrestricted donations due to a few bad apples.
Charity Watch
Here's a site that tracks this type of thing, for large organizations:
http://www.charitywatch.org/
Unfortunately doesn't list small locals. But, hey... here's for information.
Criticisms
Here are some criticisms of the same org I posted (from the leading infallible source in the webs):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Institute_of...
Tough stuff to figure out.
Kaz
Good for you for doing it and good for you for showing others so inclined, how easy it is to give a helping hand.
Bravo!
Anyone who can afford it, should try to give time, food, money.