Local organizations participate in Giving Tuesday

Westside Housing is asking for help to give the area free internet access, as part of Giving Tuesday.

Today is Giving Tuesday, a new holiday started in 2012 to encourage people to remember charitable causes during the holiday season.

“Giving Tuesday is only on its third year, but it’s quickly become a sensation with non-profits, donors and charitable causes,” CNN reported today. “It’s engaged more 13,000 non-profit and corporate partners—from Microsoft and PayPal to CVS Caremark and Toys R Us—and the Red Cross and countless other charities. While numbers are hard to come by since the charities and pledges are so diverse, organizers say the campaign has increased awareness and donations to charity.”

Here’s a sampling of local Giving Tuesday ideas that have crossed our mailbox this week:

• Charlotte Street Foundation: We’re proud and grateful to know you. Today, on Giving Tuesday, we ask you to give. Give NOW, before you write your next email, before you read about your next opportunity to save on shopping. Magnify your giving by making a donation to Charlotte Street. Reach our hundreds of artists, and thousands of audiences, with your $30 gift today. Or your $20 gift, or your $50 gift. As we close our fiscal year this month, a gift at any amount will help Charlotte Street continue to bring quality programming that is dedicated to meeting the needs of our community.
• Westside Housing Organization: Help the Westside go Wireless  for #GivingTuesday!  Visit our neighbor.ly page, Connect the Westside, and make your gift of just $20 to connect this neighborhood to opportunity today! Affordable internet connectivity creates opportunity by providing access to employment and information. Providing free access to information technology is an innovative way to create sustainable, just, neighborhoods. Our goal is to create access to opportunity and information by providing free wireless internet connectivity to the entire Westside. We are starting with the northern end of our neighborhood with a study that will determine the hard cost of installing this wide area network.
• Friends of KC Animals: Friends of KC Animals (FoKCA) has spayed/neutered and medically treated over 500 animals so far in 2014. We work 365 days a year to provide solutions for struggling pet owners and animals we encounter online and from vet clinic and shelter referrals. We facilitate adoptions and Return-To-Owners from shelters, and spay & neuter every cat and dog we can in an effort to prevent unwanted litters and costly health problems for them in the future. In order to do all of this, we need your support. Friends of KC Animals always appreciates your tax-deductible donations and would be so grateful to be on your Giving Tuesday list this year!
• Gordan Parks School: As you are working your way through Black Friday to Cyber Monday, please set Gordon Parks Elementary School as your charity on smile.amazon.com and a percentage of your purchase will go to the children and the programs at our school! Please share and enjoy a safe and wonderful holiday season!