by Judge Stanley Peele
Lately, a lot of people have called our home asking for money for various charities. Our response is to quickly and politely decline to donate money that way. Evidently, our response is appropriate. It turns out that the telemarketers are collecting a larger slice of the pie than they did a few years ago. The latest figures reveal that, on an average, the telemarketer gets 48% of the pie. This makes Elaine Marshall, the NC Secretary of State, "uncomfortable."
She advises people to quiz anyone who calls to ask for money. I disagree. The telemarketer wants to engage the donor in conversation; the more they talk, the more likely the donor will feel obligated to make a donation. I feel that donating money in response to phone calls is a poor way to make charitable contributions.
Some organizations capitalize on the on certain "buzz" words, such as "children" various kinds of law enforcement personnel, or firefighters.
The internet has several web pages that can help a person decide what charities are reliable. One of the best ones is the "Charity Navigator" (CN). It reveals a great deal of financial information about charities; and ranks them from zero stars (the most questionable) to four stars (the most reliable).
I will start with organizations that are highly rated by CN. Of special note are the organizations that do not accept any federal or state funds and yet still keep their fund-raising costs to a minimum. Here are three of them: First, the most efficient one is the New American Foundation which spent only 4% of its budget on fund-raising. Unbelievably good! Next is the Animal Welfare Institution, spending only 1.1% on fund-raising. Finally, the American Endowment Fund spent only 3.1%. All of these are ranked 4-star.
Here are six well-known organizations that CN gives a 4-star ranking:
Nature Conservancy, Doctors Without Borders, Oxfam, Direct Relief International, Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina, and the American Red Cross. The first five have had a high rating for years; and it is good to see the Red Cross regain its ranking again.
Lesser ratings were given to the following: United Way of Central Carolina had a 3-star ranking. I was disappointed to see that the Heifer Project International only had a two-star ranking for efficiency and a 3-star ranking overall. The American Cancer Society has a 2-star ranking, as does Habitat For Humanity-Orange, and Stop Hunger Now, the Raleigh based charity. However, Stop Hunger Now has a 4-star rating as to efficiency.
CN gave an even lower ranking to The March of Dimes. They spent 17.5% of their expenses on fund-raising, and received only a one-star rating. Their president earned a salary of $467,500.
Now let’s go to lowest end of the scale. According to CN, here is a list of four Organizations, followed by the per-cent of their budget that is spent on fund-raising:
The American Foundation For Disabled Children: 84.2% for fund-raising.
The American Deputy Sheriffs’ Assn. spent 89.1% for fund-raising.
The Association For Firefighters and Paramedics: 89.85% on fundraising.
The Committee For Missing Children spends 90.4% of its funds on fund-raising!! Unbelievable! All four organizations have a zero star rating.
Another good internet site that gives pertinent information on charities is Give.org.
They give the following facts about the NAACP: They spent 9% of their budget on fund-raising, and spent 24% of their budget on administrative costs. Give.org reports that the NAACP did not meet 3 standards of accountability, having to do with their financial records. The NAACP did not report the salary of the new president; however the past president made $269,600 per year.
Give.org reports that the American Friends’ Service Committee spends 13% of its expenses for fund-raising, and spend 7% on administration. They met all the standards of accountability. Their CEO gets $166,250 per year.
The Office of the Secretary of State of NC (SOC) has just published its report for the year leading up to July 1, ‘06. It is 273 pages long. If you are serious about checking up on your charities, read this report.
Those organizations that chose to hire professionals for fund-raising sometimes received the full amount; and some got nothing at all. The report first lists all the charities that filed with the SOC. If you will skip over this and go on to the last parts of the report, you will read some shocking information. You will see that many people in NC donate money to telemarketers, yet sometimes only a small portion of the money reaches the charity.
According to the report, professional fund-raisers of various fraternal orders of police (in different locations) gave only 24% to 38% to the charities they represented. The American Lung Assn. fund-raisers collected $1,045,000 but gave only $46,600 to the charity. Fund-raisers received $285,000 for the Paralyzed Veterans of America, and paid nothing to the charity.
This was shocking to me.
Please look up these internet sources before you donate to a charity.
