Hey Sam, I remember reading a post or response from you about how to give to charities anonymously, but now that I’m searching, I’m finding a few different responses but still have questions. Any chance you could do a round up post? Wondering about the following:

1. How to give cash

2. How to give small amounts anonymously (e.g., if you can’t set up a DAF)

3. How to opt out of being sent branded junk if you can’t give anonymously, because it will end up in the garbage (seriously, no more pens, stickers or magnets please)

4. In giving anonymously, how important is the tax receipt? I only take the standard deduction on my taxes… is there a reason to bother with tracking the receipts?

Appreciate your help!

Ah yeah, it's rough knowing how to do some of these things. I've written about some of them, probably most of them, but disparately over several posts, so let me see if I can answer succinctly and all in one place.

How to give cash: You are pretty much confined to two options, giving cash to a staffer in person or mailing cash in an envelope. If you have access to the office of the nonprofit you may be able to swing by and drop the cash off, but it's not super convenient and often not possible. If you're at an event you can hand it in an envelope to a staffer, and that's really the only way my organization gets cash donations, but that requires you to be at the event. And technically I can't recommend mailing cash since the risk of theft is a real one. Giving cash is fine legally, but nonprofits often aren't thrilled with it because it can put their staff at risk and also there's, well, there's no way to track that donation to a person. But yeah, throw them dollars between two thick sheets of paper and mail that in with a note saying "This is for the XYZ organization" so they know they can accept it.

2. Giving small amounts anonymously: It depends on how you're defining 'small'; I have a DAF (for the readers: a Donor Advised Fund -- I talk a little about them here but I've never gone indepth) which has no minimum deposit or minimum monthly contribution, but they do have a minimum donation amount of $20. To me that's not especially large, but I know to many people it can be. Pretty much the only way to give an amount smaller than $20 anonymously is to give online through the nonprofit's website using a cash giftcard (like a Visa gift debit card), and just not give an address. If you custom-order checks you can sometimes order checks without a home address, or with the bank's address, and pay with one of those, but I've never tried that.

If you do use a DAF (and I can recommend Charityvest, they've been mine for several years now) you can always set up to pay small amounts into it and just have them send all that money in a lump sum once or twice a year. I pay in $75/mo and from that they pay out three $20 donations a month, and at the end of the year the extra $180 that has just sat there becomes a nice extra donation. Always bearing in mind of course that once you pay into a DAF that money is gone, you can't claw it back even if you haven't "donated" it yet -- just putting money in a DAF is considered a donation. Readers, if you're curious about DAFs I recommend googling, lots of banks have "what is a DAF" pages, but if you're not finding what you want to know do feel free to come ask me.

3. Opting out of swag when not giving anonymously: I'm tempted to just say "Ya can't" because it's hard, especially with larger orgs. Even if you opt out, often you'll still get mailings that are considered "stewardship" (maintaining a relationship) rather than "solicitation" (asking for giving) and swag counts as stewardship. You can always start with sending the org a letter saying "Please put me on a Do Not Contact list, I will continue to give but don't want to get your swag". If that doesn't work, start returning mailings -- if you get something from the org don't even open it, just write "return to sender -- no longer resident" and drop it in the mail. This is not guaranteed effective; some places will either just change the name to 'resident' or retry every so often just in case. You can call the org and ask to speak to "records" or "data", and then just be super up front: "I want to keep supporting you but I really don't want the swag, how do I get that turned off?" They can help, but if you give to another similar org, a lot of times orgs will do "list exchanges" where they swap mailing lists, and if the org does that and you're on the other org's list, you get put right back on the "ok to mail" list for the first org.

I will say, swag is very, very cheap and gets results, so you can also look at this as "well, it was wasted on me, but the five cents this pen cost will get them $1 from someone, so in accepting it, I am still helping them to gain donations." This depends on your tolerance for waste, of course, which I'll talk more about in a minute.

(I personally like getting magnets, because I put stickers over top of whatever's printed on the magnet, cut it out to the shape of the sticker, and behold! I have a cool magnet!)

4. Tax receipting: I'm not a CPA or a tax lawyer and I fucked this up the last time I talked about it, so take this with a grain of salt, but there is an "above and beyond" deduction -- after the standard deduction I believe you can deduct an additional up-to-$300 for charitable giving, and if you were to be audited you'd need receipts to prove that. (As I said, if you're planning on this, fact-check first, I am not a strong source for this information.) (Edited to add: comments informed me this is no longer the case, so I'm glad I added in the disclaimer :D) If you give via a DAF, no problem; the DAF tracks where and when and how much you gave, so I could use my DAF's records as "receipts". You can also, if you lost or didn't get a receipt, contact the org and ask them for your giving record for the year. Here's the problem -- if you are giving in a way that allows you to avoid giving your address, there may be no way to get those receipts, since you can't prove their record with your name on it is you. So if you want receipts but want to give semi-anonymously definitely make sure they have your email address. If you're giving $300 a year, you probably want to take that deduction; if you're giving $20 a year, probably it isn't worth it. But yeah, to get a receipt you generally have to give them enough information for them to identify you, but you don't need giving receipts if all you take is the standard deduction.

All in all, the options are -- give cash and get no receipt, give via DAF or using a giftcard and get receipts to your email, give with your address attached and just hope they honor your request to be removed from swag mailing, or give however you want, put up with the swag, and bear in mind that them sending you the pen or magnet or keychain wasn't much of a problem or cost for them and will get them money from someone.

Honestly, option four isn't the least irritating, but it's probably the least labor-intensive for you. But it really is a question of what you want from your relationship to the nonprofits you support, and how passionately you feel about the "waste" status of swag they send. Only you can determine where your tolerance point is between "having to put in so much effort not to get this stuff" and "having to throw this stuff in a landfill". It's a regrettable part of being a donor and building a relationship with a nonprofit, but we in the nonprofit field do appreciate your giving and your tolerance :) While there are some outlier bad-actors in the space, trust me, for most nonprofits, nothing we do is gratuitous. Almost all of us are on such a thin wire that if something costs us money and doesn't get us more money, it gets binned very quickly.

Some words from Tim in honor of Willie and Mozzie Mania. (And thanks to Penny for getting him talking!) And if you'd like to honor Willie's memory by helping out a fantastic organization he was devoted to, the folks at You Gotta Believe would welcome any amount of donation to the Willie Garson Fund.

Well, we're sad to report that apparently within the past few days, You Gotta Believe has ended direct contributions to Willie's fund. Still, Willie was a tireless advocate for them and their mission of finding every child a permanent home. You can donate to the organization's general fund here.

Watch the American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 now: https://youtu.be/bWiW4Rp8vF0?feature=shared

The American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 broadcast recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by active climate leaders. Watch to find out which finalist received the $50,000 grand prize! Hosted by Vanessa Hauc and featuring Bill McKibben and Katharine Hayhoe!

Hi, everybody! Guess what? I turn 30 in a week!

If you're like me, you were devastated to hear about the wildfires that ravaged Hawaii recently. One of the best birthday presents you could give me would be to join me in donating to Direct Relief as part of the aid effort: https://donate.directrelief.org/give/406660/#!/donation/checkout

You could also donate to any of these other charitable causes I support! Thanks for all your help!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OAxtjWOq-IFhITaed7qA3-HiBJt-UXtbFmB96bFIX3Q/edit?usp=sharing

If you’re in public and get pressured to donate to a charity and you want to say no without being pressured:

Just say you already give monthly.

I do this all the time and it works, unless they’re not soliciting donations or are doing something else.

And remember:

If you want to give, but don’t because you’re not familiar with that charity, there is no reason to feel guilty. An informed donation is better than an ill-informed donation. You can always research and give online later.

If you can’t afford to give, there is no reason to feel guilty you can’t give. You cannot give what you do not have. (And no: your last $5 going to yourself instead of charity is not selfish)

If your money goes to other charitable causes then there is also no reason to feel guilty.

If you have money to give, but don’t and feel guilty about that, that’s a reminder to yourself to look for a charitable cause you do want to support.

Okay! So, January charitable giving round-up.

I wrote about this a fair amount in December, but one of my NYRs for this year was to be more open about the donations I make to charity. I laid out my reasoning in the post I linked, but the long and short of it is that talking about charitable giving publicly is difficult for me, but I want to get over that mental hurdle because I learned that talking about charitable giving publicly leads to more charitable support.

So this January my donations were:

My regular monthly donations:

Philabundance (food aid in Philadelphia)

Immigration Equality (provides legal aid to queer and/or HIV+ immigrants seeking asylum)

my local community fridge (google to find one near you)

My monthly donation to a charity that seems timely:

Palestine Children's Relief Fund (medical aid for children in Palestine)

Women for Women International (currently focused on supplies for women in Palestine)

And then the third kind, new this year and kind of fun, is in honor of this poll, which inspired me to make a donation each month to a charity that one of my favorite characters would support.

For my first character, I chose my very beloved Guillermo de la Cruz, everyone’s favorite vampire-loving vampire slayer from What We Do In The Shadows. There were a lot of directions to go with this (I seriously considered a blood drive, lmao) but I think in the end I’m going to go with the Boys and Girls Clubs of America for my January donation.

In s4 of WWDITS, we found out that Guillermo had been raised by a single mom who had to work a lot throughout his childhood, making him feel really lonely and forcing him to grow up far too fast. (And arguably making him more than a little weird and codependent.) He was really focused on making sure that Baby Colin never had to raise himself the way he had, and he wanted to make sure that Colin had good support, a safe and loving home, and proper socialization with other kids his own age.

So I think choosing an organization designed to support kids coming from home lives that are less than ideal would be something he’d like. They create safe spaces for kids to learn, grow, and socialize, and they provide mentorship opportunities to kids who need adult support that they’re not getting at home.

I was about to donate to my local University Master Gardener extension and the Arbor Day Foundation, but turns out the charitable tax deduction for Standard Deductions (which 95%+ of Americans take) was only for 2020 and 2021 as part of covid relief.

Now the only way to get any tax-advantaged benefit to charitable donations is to file with Itemized deductions.

In 2016, 35% of Americans filed itemized deductions.

In 2021, various sources say between 5% and 13% of households file itemized.

Republicans and Democrats have both been submitting proposals to allow charitable donations to apply regardless of standard/itemized deduction since 2017, but even after it was included for 2020 and 2021 it was allowed to expire and is now back to normal.

I can't even imagine the kind of impact this has had on revenue for charities and nonprofits, eliminating any kind of incentive for the average American to donate their already-dwindling paycheck. The American public and both political parties want to be able to donate, but the incentive is not there anymore. Fucking sort it out.

Your gift today will send microSD cards preloaded with Jesus Film Project® content to unreached people so they can watch films about Jesus in their heart language in the privacy of their homes.

1.2: Interview with John Okhiulu from the Decolonizing Wealth Project

Continuing with our re-uploading of episodes from the vault for your ease of finding, here is 1.2 where Ariel sits down with John Okhiulu from the Decolonizing Wealth Project to talk about the role of philanthropy in addressing racial capitalism and repar

Hello listeners! Continuing with our re-uploading of season one episodes from the vault for your ease of finding, here is episode 2 of season 1. In this episode of Solarpunk Presents, Ariel sits down with John Okhiulu from the Decolonizing Wealth Project to talk about the role of philanthropy in addressing racial capitalism and reparations, and how the DWP is working to change the narrative…

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If anybody has a charity that they really care about, please name it down below! I finally got a job, so that means it’s time for me to start donating a little bit every month again! Name a charity, and I’ll look them up and see about adding them to my list (:

Pet Portraits are back at the Anti-Cruelty Society! Deebs and Dot were adopted from the Anti-Cruelty Society, so it's a favorite nonprofit of mine to support. And this is my favorite fundraiser EVER -- you donate $30 and one of the volunteers draws a portrait of your pet from a photo you submit.

You never know who will be doing the art so you never know what it will look like; in the past I've gotten a digital sketch by what was obviously a very young volunteer, a digital collage, and a beautiful tiny oil painting. I usually give them as gifts, so I've never had the Cryptids done, but this year I'm treating myself. I can't wait to see how the portraits come out!

Mozzie's day to shine

Next month will mark what would have been Willie Garson's 60th birthday. It will also mark our celebration of Willie's special day in the form of our third annual Mozzie Mania.

As with our other creative events, this one is open to any type of fan creation, and the only requirement is that Mozzie is a major focus of the work. Oh, and if you're playing bingo with us, you're free to use one of your card prompts to make something about Moz. (And if you're not playing bingo, would you like to?) There will be an AO3 collection (Mozzie Mania 2024, unrevealed until Feb. 20th) where you can post most types of work, and please remember to tag us when you share via socials.

Also, as we've done the past couple of years, we'll also be using this event as a way to help continue Willie's legacy by supporting You Gotta Believe, a foster care organization that was near and dear to his heart. For each of the first 25 Mozzie Mania entries, we'll be donating $5 to the Willie Garson Fund at YGB, which was established after his passing. And though we know money's tight all over these days, if you've got even a couple of bucks to spare, we'd encourage you to donate whatever you can on February 20th. We should see how many individual donations we could generate on Willie's birthday!

And that's it, simple as pie. It's our annual day to have lots of Mozzie fun!

The tldr version:

Create something (draw, write, vid, whatever) starring Mozzie

Share it on February 20th to celebrate Willie and Mozzie Mania

Chip in a few bucks to Willie's charity if you can (we are, too)

Have fun

Let’s talk about US Pre-immigration Tax Planning [Video]

please consider helping me out, i need $100 to cover a car repair and i do not know what to do to pay it. i am already struggling with rent this month and if i cannot afford the car repair, i cannot work. please help if you can but do not feel guilty if you cannot. even $1 will help. thank you for your time.

paypal • venmo: @HannahMRichardson

My Monthly Charitable Giving

I am sharing this list only because I think these are important organizations and, if you're looking for places to donate, these are good ones.

Greater Chicago Food Depository (Combat hunger)

Doctors Without Borders (Note: This is also my Amazon Smile charity) (Medical access and emergency response)

Monthly to All-Options Mutual Aid Campaign - Hoosier Abortion Fund (Note: I grew up in Indiana, which is why I chose this particular group) (Abortion access)

RAICES (Immigration Support)

Chicago Torture Justice Center (Address police brutality)

Assata's Daughters (Support Black women/Black liberation)

I also give regularly to my church, which then sends a portion of our budget each year to our ministry partners, which includes things like ELCA World Hunger (Hunger), the Night Ministry (Homelessness), Interfaith Committee for Detained Immigrants (Immigration), Arise Chicago (Immigration), Faith in Place (Environment), ReconcilingWorks (LGBTQIA+), and Refugee One (Immigration).

I also give several one-time donations throughout the year, such as to the Organization for Transformative Works, Worldbuilders, etc.

And I've started donating my time as a volunteer with Tutoring Chicago each week.

And, as discussed in my last post, I'm going to add the Rainforest Action Network to this list of monthly donations. I chose this charity because they support empowering Indigenous people to protect their forests while also lobbying corporations to change.

Note: I'm not giving huge amounts here. To some I'm only giving like $10/month. But I like knowing that I'm giving something to these causes that matter to me.

So I have a few NYRs, which I might get into later, but I wanna talk about two right now!

One is actually a recycled NYR. I didn't do a very good job last time lmao. I've talked about this before, but I grew up in an environment were donations of time and money were highly encouraged, but taking any credit for it was highly discouraged. There are a lot of reasons for that, some of them complicated, but I'll leave it at that. As a result, I have made regular donations to various charities, but have always done so anonymously.

That said, I was donating to one a couple years ago (an... abortion fund, maybe?) and when I marked the box to give anonymously, a little pop-up came up that basically said, y'know, maybe reconsider? I know a lot of people think it's more virtuous not to take "credit" for charitable giving, but studies actually show that visible giving encourages others to follow suit. It spreads awareness of specific causes, reminds others to give, and -- well, I guess the psychological effect is to have people be like "wow, that person is a good person for giving. I also wish to be good, so I will also give."

Visible giving is contagious, is what I'm getting at.

And so I was sitting there thinking, like... Okay, so what is actually more important to me? Being "humble" and giving on the DL, or actually getting charities more donations? Being frank with you, it's the latter. So I've been trying to be more open about my giving habits.

That said, I've gotta admit that this has been a remarkably difficult habit for me to break. It's so, so hard for me to be like "HEY GUYS, GUESS WHAT I DID TODAY?" It makes me feel like an asshole who wants to look benevolent on the backs of the needy, and I hate it!

But... that's why I made it a NYR to be much more transparent about my giving habits. I'm not going to tell everyone specific dollar amounts or anything, but I do want to be clear about what I'm doing when I'm doing it. Maybe I'll be lucky and it'll encourage others to give as well.

So I'm going to try harder to do that this coming year, but I'm also going to be working in another NYR.

I know this was a silly jokey tumblr poll, but I actually love a lot of the options. I might end up doing a few. But the one I wanna talk about here is making a donation to a charity that one of your favorite characters would give to. I love that idea. It's so fun and also forces you to consider good causes you might not otherwise think about. So I really want to do that in 2024.

So... here's how I usually donate. I have a few charities that I give a small amount to every month. A lot of charities really like this because then they have regular money coming in that they can rely on. I also usually give to another cause at least once during that month. Sometimes it can be related to something going on that month (like queer causes in June) and sometimes it can be something related to a current crisis (like disaster relief) and sometimes it's just random.

This year I'm going to be adding the character charity! So that means each month I'll have my regular donations, my one-time donation, and a character donation. At the beginning of each month, I'll plug my three regular donations (might add one or two more depending on finances) and whatever I've decided the character donation to be. At some point during the month, I'll also talk about whatever that one-time donation is. I tend to decide at the end of the month, unless some crisis has happened in the meantime. That allows me to leave money in case of... well, crises. lmao

I'll make a separate post on January 1st so it's not at the end of a wall of text, but my three regular donations are to Philabundance (an organization that feeds the hungry here in Philadelphia), Immigration Equality (an organization that helps LGBTQ and/or HIV+ people immigrate and apply for asylum), and my local community fridge. (Not linking to this because it would out my neighborhood, but I'm sure you have one near you that you can donate to.)

For my first character, I chose my very beloved Guillermo de la Cruz, everyone's favorite vampire-loving vampire slayer from What We Do In The Shadows. There were a lot of directions to go with this (I seriously considered a blood drive, lmao) but I think in the end I'm going to go with the Boys and Girls Clubs of America for my January donation.

In s4 of WWDITS, we found out that Guillermo had been raised by a single mom who had to work a lot throughout his childhood, making him feel really lonely and forcing him to grow up far too fast. (And arguably making him more than a little weird and codependent.) He was really focused on making sure that Baby Colin never had to raise himself the way he had, and he wanted to make sure that Colin had good support, a safe and loving home, and proper socialization with other kids his own age.

So I think choosing an organization designed to support kids coming from home lives that are less than ideal would be something he'd like. They create safe spaces for kids to learn, grow, and socialize, and they provide mentorship opportunities to kids who need adult support that they're not getting at home.

(I'm actually making a donation to them now as they're having a donation doubling drive through the end of the year, but I think December 27th is close enough to January. lmao. Let's not get bogged down in semantics.)

I'll post about this again on the 1st because I want to get into that habit, but... yeah! If anyone else wants to do this with me, just lmk. I'd love to hear about the character causes you're supporting, too. If you decide to donate to any of the causes I link throughout the year, I also want to hear about that! I'd love to know that my posts are helping people.

"Goodfellows Fund Reaches High Mark - Autos Needed For Christmas Morning," Windsor Record. December 20, 1913. Page 1. ---- A Christmas Vision But it can only come true if those who have plenty remember those who have nothing.