North Texas Giving Day provides support to nonprofits

For Meals on Wheels of Tarrant County, North Texas Giving Day has become one of its biggest days for receiving donations.

Like other North Texas nonprofit agencies, Meals on Wheels’ donations have grown each year.

“For all of the nonprofits, it is tremendously important,” said Keith Harrison, manager of marketing and community relations for Meals on Wheels.

As of 9 p.m. Thursday, more than 100,000 gifts had been made totaling more than $40 million.

The event, now in its seventh year, benefits more than 2,000 nonprofits across the DFW area, including the Star-Telegram’s Goodfellow Fund, which was involved for the first time.

“On behalf of the anticipated 18,500 needy school children we hope to serve this season, I am so appreciative that the Goodfellow Fund for the first time is a part of this terrific initiative,” said Richard Greene, Goodfellows’ executive director.

“I have to admit I was a little apprehensive as I checked the totals early this morning — only one gift for $25. But by 6:30 p.m. the total had grown to 35 gifts totaling $7,105.”

Overall, gifts were running ahead of last year, said Carol Goglia, a spokeswoman for the Communities Foundation of Texas, the organization putting on the event.

“It's going great,” Goglia said about 9 p.m. “We surpassed our donation level from last year and hit 100,000 gifts for 2,008 nonprofits – all increases over last year. We also are 19 percent ahead of donors vs. this time last year.”

For Meals on Wheels, which provided more than 1 million meals to the elderly and disabled in Tarrant County last year, the day provides a chance to reach new donors.

“We raised $55,000 last year and that makes a tremendous impact on our budget,” Harrison said. “People in this area have really rallied around this local day of giving.”

It provides donors a chance to give to variety of causes on one day.

“Whether it’s helping elderly people, local food banks, fighting cancer or helping promote diabetes prevention there are endless organizations out there you can support,” Harrison said. “It's a great snapshot of the work that being done in our community.”

This story was originally published September 17, 2015 at 12:24 PM with the headline "North Texas Giving Day provides support to nonprofits."