9 posts tagged “charitable cause”

My superstitious side wantsed to donate to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation in the hopes that it would buy me some good boob karma. I have been lucky so far--I have not been touched by breast cancer in my family or peer group...yet. I feel like this disease is a lurking menace coiling up and ready to pounce on one of my loved ones at any time. I hear those scary statistics about how prevalent this cancer is. And guys, I am so sorry, but you are not immune to this illness either. The good news is all of the dollars being spent on breast cancer research is having an impact: new treatments are becoming available and preventive testing improves all the time. It looks like if we band together and throw enough money at this thing, we can actually beat it.

Donate yourself at: http://www.bcrfcure.org

I know that I have blogged about Best Friends Animal Society and Sanctuary before, but this no-kill shelter is my favorite charity because they help the most vulnerable animals of all: those afflicted with permanent illnesses, handicaps or other debilitating conditions that otherwise would have been abandoned, ignored, or euthanized by other shelters.*

Best Friends also reaches out to animal lovers in other nations (e.g., Thailand after the tsunami, Lebanon after the bombings) to help animals in crisis and in the aftermath of natural disasters. Furthermore, Best Friends teaches other organizations how to successfully establish, maintain, and fund new no-kill shelters.

Anyone can volunteer at Best Friends' facility in Utah, if only to walk a dog or play with a cat for a few hours; and if your pet ever comes down with a weird, mysterious condition (as happened with our cat Kahlua last year), you can send Best Friends an email and they will respond with their unique expertise.

This year, Best Friends aims to double its membership, so my family and I renewed our own $25 membership and then bought another one for my animal loving sister Becky as a birthday gift for her. If you are an animal advocate, at least check out all of the interactive resources available on the Best Friends site, www.bestfriends.org.

*Animals are euthanized at Best Friends only if they are suffering from continuous extreme pain and no other medical measures are available to save them and let them lead comfortable lives.

This being April, we have made four donations to charities so far this year. Here they are:

January 2008: Brunswick Volunteer Fire Company: http://http://bvfd5.org/

Living within a few blocks of the fire house as I do, I hear the siren go off all the time, so I know how often these volunteers go out there to help both Brunswick and other nearby towns combat fires, respond to car crashes and other emergencies, and help people in need. Brunswick's firehouse staff is an all volunteer force--Frederick County does not provide them with an annual budget, so they have to get funding from the citizenry. I have been helped out by firemen and firewomen before in my lifetime, so I like to contribute to my local fire hall to say thanks.

February 2008: Brunswick Volunteer Ambulance & Rescue

200 W Potomac St, Brunswick, MD 21716

My son, who is in California at this very moment visiting his birth mother, decided that our family's December 2007 charitable contribution would go to California wildfire relief. We donated some money to the California Community Foundation's "Southern California Wildfire Relief Fund" today. My husband chooses the January 2008 charity--we rotate turns every month and try to always pick a different charity (although there's a few repeats every year, depending on our favorite causes.)

I was randomly flipping channels yesterday and came across an emotional CNN interview with one of the volunteers who works for a wildlife organization in the San Francisco Bay Area. She made a desperate and tearful plea for donations to help her group care for the many sea birds and other animals who have become ill and disabled due to last week's oil spill in the bay. I immediately rushed to my computer to donate money to her organization, WildCare. WildCare is my family's November Charity of the Month. (On a side note, although I did not blog about it at the time, World Wildlife Fund was our October Charity of the Month.)

You can donate any amount you want--even just $1--to WildCare to help save the birds and animals affected by the oil spill. Any amount will help. Just go to the website below and donate using your credit or debit card. This money is desperately needed now to save as many creatures as possible.

www.wildcaremarin.org

My son selected this September Charity o' the Month, the Shriners Hospital for Children, because one of his friends suffered from and was successfully treated for a cleft lip, and my son wants to help out other kids who have this condition. The 22 Shriners Hospitals for Children in the USA, Mexico and Canada have been treating children with spinal cord injuries, severe burns, and other disfiguring conditions for 85 years now and they received a 3-star ranking from Charity Navigator for their operational efficiency. The Shriners Hospitals for Children also engage in medical research that will benefit everyone, not just children.

This month our charitable contribution went to the Yellow Ribbon Fund for recovering veterans. In their own words, "The Yellow Ribbon Fund was created in early 2005 to assist our injured service members and their families while they recuperate at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center," both of which are located near Washington, DC, in the Maryland suburbs, just a short drive away from our home in Brunswick.

The best way to illustrate the impact of the Yellow Ribbon Fund is this exerpt from their website:

"From March 1, 2005 through February 28, 2007, contributions made through the Yellow Ribbon Fund have provided our military members and their families with:

• over 475 free rental cars,
• over 3,700 free taxi rides,
• over 1,600 free rooms in hotels,
• over 33 families the free use of our 3 apartments,
• hundreds of free tickets to sporting games, concerts and plays, and
• hundreds of lunches, dinners, golf games, duck and goose hunts,
  fishing trips, etc."

For an example of Yellow Ribbon Fund donations at work, check out the blog of the very articulate, brave, strong, and funny Josie Salzman over at Life in a Cracker Box. This amazing young lady has been assisting her husband JR with his recovery after he lost an arm and a finger and sustained multiple other injuries in an attack in Iraq. The Yellow Ribbon Fund helps people like JR and Josie access the services of rental car companies and hotels during the many months away from home that it entails to rehabilitate after suffering such severe injuries.

This month we donated to Project Cuddle, an organization that aims to prevent the abandonment of children. They staff a 24-hour-a-day toll-free hotline for parents in crisis who require assistance to either help them keep their child or else find their child a better home. This charity seems particularly appropriate for us because we might become adoptive parents one day. Also, several years ago, I became involved in the case of a woman who hid her pregnancy due to intense fear of physical abuse, which unfortunately led to disastrous consequences for both her and her baby. (I became involved in her situation after her pregnancy was revealed and she needed a lot of support.) I don't want other young women and kids to go through the kind of suffering and fear that she went through.

What are some charitable causes that you support or would like to support?

This Question of the Day is a great opportunity for me to ramble on about my favorite charity in the world, Best Friends Animal Sanctuary (www.bestfriends.org). I contribute money to Best Friends every year, and this year I might even make and donate a necklace of semi-precious stones for them to give away as a prize in their summer fundraiser.

This huge no-kill shelter in Utah takes in domestic animals large and small, from parakeets to horses, and rehabilitates local injured wildlife as well. They have a wonderfully innovative and sustainable business model: in addition to standard fundraising efforts, they generate money to run the Sanctuary by marketing it as a fun travel destination where visitors can relax and/or volunteer. You can do anything from mucking stalls to cuddling kittens and puppies that need socialization with humans. (This is a form of "Volun-tourism.") The Sanctuary also has a great gift shop onsite so you can buy a souvenir from your trip or purchase some treats for your pets at home.

Best Friends Animal Sanctuary also works with other no-kill shelters around the world, publicizing their efforts and coordinating fundraising opportunities with them. Recent good works include trapping abandoned pets in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana and Mississippi, and airlifting cats and dogs to safety during the bombing of Lebanon. (Many of these animals subsequently ended up being adopted into safe American homes.)

Speaking of adoption, no matter where you live, Best Friends is a great source for pet adoptions, or for pinpointing you to other local no-kill shelters where you can adopt rabbits, birds, cats, dogs, goats, etc.

Best Friends promotes Trap-Neuter-Release programs for feral cat colonies; sponsors educational seminars and classes about animal care; publishes a full color glossy magazine that describes how your donated dollars are hard at work saving the animals; and much more. I love them and am thrilled that such a large no-kill shelter is experiencing such great success taking care of the animals.