WILLIAMSON COUNTY, Texas — Each year, nonprofit organizations around the world solicit donations from the public via a myriad of ways before the year ends. GivingTuesday, which is December 1, 2020, is powerful in that it heightens the awareness of the importance of being generous with donating on this one day to organizations that seek to better humankind.
GivingTuesday was started in 2012 through a partnership with the United Nations Foundation and New York’s 92nd Street Y. The efforts are supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, PayPal, along with support from Fidelity Charitable, Ford, Ford Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. It is run by a 10-member Board of Directors plus Co-Founder and CEO Asha Curran.
GivingTuesday supplied organizations with “toolkits” to use for participating in the event. Instructions for foundations, small businesses, nonprofits and more are listed on the worldwide organization’s website.
On a local level, in a series of tweets via Twitter on Tuesday, Gov. Greg Abbott suggested a list of charities in Texas to donate to, including Meals on Wheels, Central Texas Food Bank, the Texas Restaurant Association’s Restaurant Relief Fund, as well as Mobile Loaves and Fishes.
In Williamson County, organizations participating range from those who care for animals, to arts and culture groups, libraries, historical preservation institutions, museums, advocates for women and children, educational organizations, groups that work with senior citizens, the Salvation Army and more. In other word, just about every nonprofit group from Leander on the north and into the city of Austin seek to raise money on GivingTuesday.
Check social media pages of those organizations which are in any of the cities nearby to find out about donating. GivingTuesday also publishes online a “Do Good Calendar” for the month of December.