Donation Distress

I got a phone call today from the Police Protective Fund. I’ve given them a donation in the past, as I like the idea of helping the families of fallen law enforcement officers.

However, now that I use Charity Navigator I was able to type “Police Protective Fund” into the search bar and find out more about them. For example, the fact that $0.69 of every dollar donated is spent on fundraising. Whew! Not a good use of my money! (And by the way, before posting this, I went to the Police Protective Fund’s own website to try to verify this info. I found, when you really read their tax exempt form linked there, it indicates that $0.64 of every dollar was used for fundraising in 2005.)

Think about using this resource (http://www.charitynavigator.org/). It takes two seconds to check out an organization. A few more clicks can help you find an alternative, if needed. For example, I used it to find out that comparatively, the “Correctional Peace Officers Foundation,” which serves a similar purpose, spends $0.02 of every dollar donated on fundraising.

You can search on all kinds of organizations – health research foundations, Christian charities, etc. This site doesn’t evaluate the purposes of the organizations listed – just tracks how much of the funds they collect are used for their stated purposes.

Let’s not only be generous with the resources God has entrusted us with – but also wise!