It’s Giving Tuesday. Please join in.

Sara Rubin here, doing my part by donating today on Giving Tuesday. This occasion began as a social media hashtag and has evolved into a global movement “that unleashes the power of radical generosity.” 

My attention inevitably turns to Monterey County, where the nonprofit sector right here in my community is changing lives for the better every day. And 206 of those local organizations are featured in this year’s Monterey County Gives! campaign, a project of the Monterey County Weekly in partnership with the Community Foundation for Monterey County and the Monterey Peninsula Foundation.

The campaign runs until midnight on Dec. 31, and invites anyone to give any amount. You can also divvy up your charitable giving; $25 to one group, $35 to another. Or whatever amount you are able to give—part of the beauty of this initiative is that you don’t need to be a bigtime donor to participate. You can give $5 total, or $5 each to five different nonprofits, setting the amount in a convenient digital shopping cart. One of the things I love about MCGives! is that it democratizes philanthropy and makes it as simple as online shopping, no paper checks or postage required. 

There’s something simultaneously depressing and uplifting I feel when I read about the wide-ranging and deeply meaningful missions of all 206 groups. The depressing part is that they are needed at all—but homelessness and hunger are very real problems in Monterey County. Volunteer fire departments are critical first responders in rural communities. It makes me realize that so many basic services I expect are delivered only because of the hard work of nonprofit organizations and volunteers. This, it seems, is a precarious way to run a society. 

But then comes the uplifting part. Even if our reality requires significant investment from the nonprofit sector in order to thrive, the nonprofit sector is contributing in a wide variety of meaningful ways to enable everyone to do just that: to thrive. 

Whether you are motivated to support art or music classes for kids, community garden maintenance, or spay/neuter services for cats and dogs, the nonprofits featured this year in MCGives! are helping our community thrive. 

Given that tomorrow is both National Cookie Day and National Sock Day, it seems only fair that a day devoted to charitable giving made the cut for the calendar. I hope you join in #GivingTuesday, however you can.