Where I’ve been

Posted on October 19, 2011 by admin

Obviously, I haven’t been blogging in a few months. This is not really unusual for me. If anything, the most unusual thing is that I went so long before I stopped blogging. I’ll usually start blogs with the very best intentions of keeping them updated and then, after a while, just get too busy or uninterested to continue. So, first off I want to apologize for disappearing like that.

In the meantime, since I stopped, I did continue making charitable contributions. My New Year’s Resolution for 2011 was to donate to charity every week, not to blog about it. I had hoped that blogging about it would get people to join me in the project and maybe spark something. When that didn’t seem to be the case (or if it was, I didn’t hear any comments telling me that it was), the blogging became more of a chore than a joy, and I let myself stop.

As for the specific charities though, since I wasn’t blogging I didn’t care about sticking with just those charities that everyone could agree were worth supporting. I set up a couple as continuing contributions, meaning they’ll get an automatic donation every month until I decide to stop. I gave money to an individual family that I wanted to be completely anonymous (and I wouldn’t even mention it here, except that I discovered I wasn’t as anonymous as I thought). I gave money to political figures and groups that I support. And I’ll probably continue giving money like that through the rest of the year.

Now, this isn’t to say that all of my giving has been to things that wouldn’t have fit on the blog had I continued the effort as originally planned. I gave to The World Food Program after reading about the famine in Somalia. I also gave to Oxfam International for the same reason. And I’m now a recurring donor (as mentioned above) to UNICEF and Doctors Without Borders. I made a small donation to Friends of Yosemite Search and Rescue after they (possibly) saved my step-dad’s life (either way, he was in a pretty rough spot, and it’s hard to say if he could’ve gotten out under his own power). I also gave money to the International Red Cross (not the American one, so no tax deduction for it) as well as Share Our Strength.

I’m probably done with blogging, but I just wanted my one or two readers out there to know where I went and offer some explanation for why I stopped. I hope you’re not overly disappointed with me. I still think it was a great idea, but it’s hard to feel like the only one part of what I’d hoped could be a movement.

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Human Rights Watch – A Voice for The Oppressed

Posted on June 29, 2011 by admin

Human Rights Watch is an organization with a singular mission – to bring to light anywhere in the world where people are unjustifiably deprived of their freedom or safety. Partly, they’re a journalistic outlet, and their researchers and writers provide information to news consumers in many parts of the world. In other ways, they’re a legal advocacy group, having filed numerous amicus curiae briefs in matters of human rights cases. In another sense, they’re a think tank turned to by world leaders and UN agencies when they seek and discuss ways to advance human rights for the oppressed anywhere.

If a single label were to be applied to Human Rights Watch, then they’re a “name and shame” outfit. They work very hard to make it as uncomfortable and as embarrassing as possible to oppress the rights of other people. Since its founding, the organization has drawn attention to abusive governments, particularly where those abuses violate treaties and international laws, and contributed greatly to the rise in democratic freedoms enjoyed in many formerly-oppressed places around the world today.

They certainly don’t resemble any of the other charities I’ve highlighted so far this year. But I really like their mission, and I’d like to see it continue its work of bringing attention to suffering throughout the world and on finding solutions for it.

Posted in Human Rights, Journalism and Public Media | Leave a comment

SmileTrain – And the world smiles with you

Posted on June 21, 2011 by admin

Few things in this world are more precious, innocent, or beautiful than a child’s smile. But for a child in the developing world born with a cleft lip or palette, this universal expression of joy may appear ugly or frightening, and lead to isolation, ridicule and depression. The cleft itself may even be dangerous to the child’s health. And yet, for over 40 years, an inexpensive surgery has been available to doctors to treat this common birth defect and greatly improve a child’s quality of life. Unfortunately, even though it can cost as little as $250, even this is out of reach for many children living in poverty.

SmileTrain is an organization that seeks to help children afflicted by cleft lip and palette. By providing this amazing surgery for free to children whose parents could not otherwise afford it, they bring not just medical care, but a new chance at a happy life. They pay for and perform surgeries and train other doctors to perform it. Dollar for dollar, few charities can make such a powerful, lasting impact on people’s lives.

Imagine giving a child their smile back. Since 2000, SmileTrain has done exactly that for 600,000 children in over 40 countries. In as little as 45 minutes, a life can be changed with one simple surgery. What an awesome thing to support! :)

Posted in Children's Causes, Global Health | Leave a comment

Riding The Divide

Posted on June 13, 2011 by admin

UPDATE: Erik has an auction running up on his website. He’s got a bunch of stuff to offer, and all the proceeds will benefit the fight against cancer. It’s just a tad confusing, but follow this link, click on the item you like, read the description, and then scroll down (possibly way down, past an expanse of whitespace that fools you into thinking you’re already at the bottom of the page, but you’re not) to see the section where you can place a bid. I wanted to post this last night, but with the way it’s designed, I thought the auction wasn’t running yet or something. Erik, seriously, let’s rethink usability next time you build an auction widget. ;)

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A few months ago, I highlighted one of my favorite people on the planet, Erik Mathy, who was committed to riding the world’s most difficult bicycle race: The Tour Divide.

There is no prize money to be won, no sponsorship, and plenty of hardship. That other race out in France is an incredibly difficult challenge, sure, but the riders don’t haul their own camping gear, they never have to overcome isolation or boredom, and medical attention is never more than a few minutes away, should it be needed.

The Tour Divide, on the other hand, is more than 500 miles longer than the French race, and fully self-supported. If you make it to a town with a hotel, you can stay in it (it’s up to you to pay for it though), otherwise try to find some comfortable grass to lie on. All you have is what you can carry or buy along the way. If your bike has a problem, you fix it yourself (or find a local bike shop). If you’re hungry you either eat some food out of your bag or stop at a store or restaurant you happen to be near. Over the course of 3 weeks (less if you want to actually win the thing), you have to travel 2700 miles from Banff, Canada to the Mexico border near Antelope Wells, NM, on a route that takes you along the Continental Divide.

But even this is not, by itself, a sufficient challenge for some. As I write this, Erik is somewhere in Montana, making his way south on – I swear I’m not making this up - a single speed bike. I’m not sure if he just doesn’t like shifting, or figured it’d keep things simple or what, but out of the 89 riders taking part in this year’s tour, he seemed to like the idea of being one of the half-dozen masochists who will ride the whole thing in the same gear.

Erik and one of his single speed bikes

1 gear is all he needs

Amazingly, he’s actually doing fairly well so far. He’s averaging about 145 miles a day right now, which puts him on pace for a competitive finish – though, he’s not technically competing for first, as he started a day ahead of the “grand depart”. This man is quite simply incredible. He’s also keeping up what has got to be the world’s most repetitive twitter feed. But enough about the tour. I get exhausted just thinking about it.

In addition to being an avid (some might say obsessed) cyclist, Erik is a guy who hates cancer like no one else I have ever met. Last time I mentioned Erik, it was when I used his site to donate to the Livestrong Foundation. This time, my donation goes to Erik’s other favorite cancer-fighting charity, the Pablove Foundation.

Pablove was named in memory of Pablo Castelaz, a little boy who was taken by cancer nearly 2 years ago after succumbing to his yearlong fight against it. His family’s heart-breaking story is all too common, with cancer being the second most common childhood cause of death in this country after accidents. Unlike most diseases, cancer is no respecter of age, taking young and old alike.

The Pablove Foundation gets cyclists to ride across the country visiting children’s hospitals and raising money for cancer research. And they were pleased to recently announce their first three grants – a huge milestone for this very young charity. We should all hope to live in a future where cancer is preventable and curable, and the research going on right now, thanks to grants from this and other foundations, is helping to make that reality come just a little sooner. If you’d like to help too, I hope you’ll join me in donating to this great charity.

And lest I forget, Erik is still trying to reach his goal for Livestrong. Why not chip in?

Posted in Cancer Research and Treatment, Children's Causes, Holy Crap, That's Impressive | 3 Comments

Kids Need To Read – Because They Do!

Posted on June 8, 2011 by admin

We don’t know how long modern humans have walked the earth. And we know almost nothing about the first ones to appear. But we know quite a lot about our history since around 4000 B.C. That’s when the first Mesopotamian writing appeared, and human knowledge and history began being recorded for future generations. What we call the dawn of civilization was really the dawn of writing. It’s writing that opens up the past, the present, and it’s our way to leave a mark on the future.

But without the ability to read it, there are people who won’t be able to share in the knowledge, history and culture that ties our world together in new and ever-increasing ways. Sure, there is recorded video and sound, and those can be wonderful, but to truly experience and interact with the world, to not only partake of culture but to participate in shaping it, one must be able to read and write.

Reading changes everything. It hones the mind, opens up new opportunities, and it makes it possible to imagine incredible new possibilities. Whether it’s a novel, an email, a blog, a subtitled film, a school textbook, a news article, a credit card statement or an end-user license agreement (just kidding, no one reads those), the ability to read is essential. And those who can’t are simply being left behind by modern society.

A child who learns to read will be far more likely to complete school and stay out of jail as an adult. But with funding tight at schools around the country, the school library is often one of the first things cut. Many schools, and particularly ones in struggling inner-city districts, haven’t had new books in years. Without good books, kids may decide that reading is boring, and never try to get good at it, and that can leave them unprepared for the world they grow up in. That’s why, for this week, I’m highlighting Kids Need to Read.

Kids Need to Read was co-founded in 2008 by author P.J. Haarsma and actor Nathan Fillion. It aims to foster literacy by sending schools exciting, well-written books that appeal to children at early reading levels. Their website claims that their carefully-selected reading list is what sets them apart from other literacy charities, and that the books they send are ones best suited to get kids eager to keep reading.

Now that I’ve discovered the charity, I’m going to let my own kids tear into that list and see what they think of it. You can learn more by visiting their website (which, not surprisingly, is very well-written), and maybe you’ll consider making a donation of your own while you’re there.

Posted in Children's Causes | 4 Comments

Operation Gratitude – Thanking our Troops

Posted on May 30, 2011 by admin

America is at war. Not in a metaphorical sense, but actual guns, bombs, pain and death war. Two wars, in fact. But because it’s happening far away, it’s easy to forget.

When our country went to war after September 11, 2001,  it was all anyone could talk about. But something strange happened in the years that followed. Or rather, something very normal did not happen.

There was no draft, no war tax (just the opposite, in fact), no one told us to buy war bonds, or said we had to ration our gas or do any of the other things that a country at war typically asks of its citizenry.

For 98% of Americans, war was something that occasionally made the news, or that in the backs of our minds we knew was happening somewhere, or that we maybe knew someone who had a family member “over there”. But in the hustle and bustle of our everyday lives, war just wasn’t something we really needed to think about. No bombs were falling here, we didn’t have any shortages or blackouts to worry about. War was happening, but we simply had other things on our minds.

The present conflict hasn’t only been extraordinary in how little civilians have been confronted with it, it has also been extraordinary in how greatly our volunteer army has been forced to sacrifice. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are now our nation’s longest, and the average soldier has been deployed and re-deployed more times than at any other point in our history.

The phrase “support our troops” has become hollow – something you “like” on Facebook or stick on the back of your car. But there are men and women right now, overseas, who deliberately put themselves between us and our enemies. Whether you believe either war was justified or not, you cannot deny the fact that these people embody immense courage in the hopes that those of us back home will remain safe from those they must confront.

It’s Memorial Day, a day of special reflection on the costs of serving in our country’s defense. And today, I wanted to do something for our soldiers more meaningful than a nice status update on my Facebook wall.

Operation Gratitude seeks to help people do just that. For $15, they can send a care package to a soldier just about anywhere. The packages themselves are made up of donated goods – snacks, toiletries, letters – the full value is around $100 apiece. The cash donations they receive are just to cover assembly and postage. And these care packages really do brighten a soldier’s day.

I hope that with this gift, I’m helping to make life a little better for someone on whom we have asked so much, and who has given back so much more and sacrificed so much more, than most people ever could.

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Doctors Without Borders – Every Life Matters

Posted on May 26, 2011 by admin

(Editor’s note – I was too busy with work to do the usual research and report for the charity I picked last week, so my wife kindly agreed to do the writing this time. Thanks, Deb.)

This weeks donation went to Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). This is a fairly well known and popular organization due in part to its policy of speaking out publicly wherever they find inhumane conditions, regardless of politics, in order to bring notice and aid. Ninety percent of MSF’s overall funding (and 100 percent of MSF-USA’s funding) comes from private, non-governmental sources.  For those not entirely familiar with this organization, here’s a few inspiring things to know.

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is an international medical humanitarian organization committed to bringing quality medical care to people in crisis regardless of their race, religion, or political affiliation. MSF operates independently of any political, military, or religious agendas. Medical teams conduct evaluations on the ground to determine a population’s medical needs before opening programs, aiming to fill holes that exist (rather than replicating services that are already offered) or reach communities that are not being attended to. The key to MSF’s ability to act independently in response to a crisis is its independent funding.

On any given day, more than 22,000 committed individuals representing dozens of nationalities can be found providing assistance to people caught in crises around the world. They are doctors, nurses, logistics experts, administrators, epidemiologists, laboratory technicians, mental health professionals, and others who work together in accordance with MSF’s guiding principles of humanitarian action and medical ethics.

MSF field staff are supported by their colleagues in 19 offices around the world, including one in New York City. The vast majority of MSF’s aid workers are from the communities where the crises are occurring, with ten percent of teams made up of international staff, including the more than 200 aid workers from the US who completed nearly 300 assignments in 2009, and the 340 US-based aid workers who left on more than 435 assignments to 45 countries in 2010.

Yesterday, May 24th, MSF published preliminary results from a children’s health study along  with a call to action. Apparently, infant mortality rates in malnutrition hotspots can be reduced by just over 50% with nutritional supplements. No surprise there, but they’ve got the facts and a plan to save to lives. To give you an idea of their commitment to this cause, here’s what they did last year. In 2010, in addition to malnutrition prevention activities, MSF and its partners, FORSANI and BEFEN / ALIMA, carried out pediatric and nutritional activities in 64 primary care facilities and nine hospitals in Niger’s Tahoua, Maradi and Zinder regions. Approximately 150,000 children suffering from malnutrition were treated—nearly half of all the malnourished children treated in the country in 2010—of whom approximately 24,000 were hospitalized. Between 85 and 92 percent of children were discharged. MSF and its partners also treated 216,330 cases of malaria among children less than five years of age, conducted more than 370,000 pediatric consultations, and admitted more than 13,000 children to hospital.

Just today, MSF published a press release about violence escalating in a refugee camp on Tunisia-Libya border. How do they know about this? Since early March, MSF has been running a mental health program for people who have fled the conflict in Libya, providing more than 9,000 mental health consultations.

Posted in Global Health | Leave a comment

California State Parks Foundation – Preserving Something Beautiful

Posted on May 17, 2011 by admin

This donation was prompted by recent events. In this case, it’s the imminent closure of several of my state’s parks. There’s not much my individual donation can do to prevent that closure – I haven’t got the $33 million it would take to do that, but it might help keep some of the other parks open.

I was born in California, spent most of my childhood here, and today I’m raising my kids here. In fact, I’m technically a 5th-generation Californian. I have several ancestors who came over in a covered wagon during the gold rush. And so I think maybe I feel an extra sense of ownership in the state. I visited many of the state parks as a child, including at least one – Henry Coe State Park – that is about to be closed. And I think it would be a tragedy if these beautiful spaces cannot be preserved for my own children.

A view from Henry W Coe state park

The parks are being shuttered, not sold or developed, which technically means they will remain the property of the state, and could in theory reopen someday. But in the meantime, people wanting to enjoy these spaces will be unable to do so, and there is a high risk that the parks themselves will be trashed by people trespassing in them, and criminals using them to produce illegal drugs. We already have problems right now with Mexican gangs using our parks to grow marijuana even where there are patrols and rangers trying to prevent them. We can virtually guarantee that such problems will get worse in the state parks that are about to be abandoned.

It’s not the first time I tried to do something about it. Back in November 2010, I voted in favor of Proposition 21, which would have funded the parks through a vehicle license fee of $18. The state would have saved $133 million by adding this dedicated funding source, no parks would have had to close, and CA-licensed vehicles would have been able to enter the parks for free. The measure failed, decisively, and to be honest I can understand why. The CA vehicle license fee is already pretty steep. But I think it would have been the right thing to do, and I’m sorry I was in the minority on it.

So today, with 70 of the parks set for closure, and since no one at the DMV is going to collect money for the parks, I sent my donation to the California State Parks Foundation instead. My kids are getting to be just about the right age to enjoy short excursions into nature, and it would be a terrible loss if there were no places left for them to do so.

Posted in Environmental Causes, Local Foundations | Leave a comment

UNICEF – For Mother’s Day

Posted on May 9, 2011 by admin

A woman in the developing world is 300 times more likely to die in childbirth than a woman in the developed world. Many of these deaths could be prevented by simple, often low-cost care and quality obstetrics. That’s according to UNICEF, the leading NGO dedicated to eradicating the causes of children’s suffering throughout the world. UNICEF has saved more children’s lives than any other humanitarian organization, providing clean water, immunization, protection, and psychosocial support to those left most vulnerable during disaster and conflict.

This Mother’s Day, I wanted my gift to go toward something that celebrates and encourages motherhood. UNICEF seemed like the obvious choice in that regard. Prenatal care and maternal health are a huge part of UNICEF’s mission to help kids. So with this gift, I just want to say Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there, and here’s hoping the future is just a little brighter for moms and their children everywhere.

Posted in Children's Causes, Global Health | Leave a comment

People for Bikes – Lobby for a Hobby!

Posted on May 2, 2011 by admin

So, this is something different. I’ve never donated to a group specifically to support their lobbying efforts in Washington, DC. Somehow, it seemed wrong to donate money in order to have it do anything other than the specific thing I wanted to support. Lobbying just seems like something sleazy, you know?

Well, today I’m trying it anyway. My little contribution for this week was a donation to People For Bikes, an organization of Bikes Belong, that seeks to get a million Americans to pledge that bikes are important to them, and to convince the federal government to support biking as a legitimate means of transportation. That means providing money for bike lanes, trails, and converting more public transit to be able to accomodate people with bikes.

I found out about the group just recently. I went online looking for a bike-related charity, and discovered the Bikes Belong Foundation. I wasn’t terribly impressed by it from reading on their site, but I saw that my local bike shop happened to be a member, so yesterday I stopped by and asked the owner about it. According to him, the Bikes Belong Foundation, in a nutshell, is an industry lobby group focused on making it easier for people to use and enjoy bikes. I went back to their website, specifically looking for their lobbying description, and here’s what they say:

Bikes Belong is the U.S. bicycle industry’s voice in Washington, D.C.

To increase federal support for bicycling, we meet regularly with members of Congress and the administration. We tout the significant societal benefits of bicycling and promote legislation that supports it. In addition, we retain a lobbying firm—Tongour Simpson Holsclaw and Cooney—to help craft messages and build stronger relationships with key U.S. senators and representatives.

Our Washington, D.C., clout grows each year. Bikes Belong’s coordinated lobbying efforts have helped increase annual federal spending on bicycle facilities from a mere $2 million to $1 billion. In the last federal transportation law (SAFETEA-LU), we invested $1 million in lobbying and gained $4.5 billion for bicycling and walking. Fiscal year 2009 bike project funding reached a new high, with $1.4 billion directed towards bicycling, twice as much as 2008. Most of this investment was secured through our lobbying efforts on the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act.

We’re making sure leaders on Capitol Hill recognize the bike industry as an important employer and see bike funding as a solid investment with health, community, congestion reduction, and air quality benefits.

So, basically, that’s what my donation is doing. It’s going to go to Tongour Simpson Holsclaw and Cooney to try and get Congress to spend money on making my ride to work safer. Gotta admit, that’s an awfully sweet multiplier effect. If a million in lobbying turns into a billion in transportation dollars, that’s a much bigger effect than my contribution all by itself.

And why is this needed, you may ask? I’ll answer that with a personal story. Yesterday, my family and I were riding the Guadalupe River Park Trail in San Jose, and discovered that our trail maps were out of date. There’s some construction that has closed off a significant portion of the trail, and a sign about it saying the trail should reopen in September 2010. Apparently, the sign is out of date too. Anyway, as a result, we were forced onto a roundabout surface street detour, portions of which didn’t even have a bike lane. San Jose ran out of funds to fix what should be a beautiful and popular bike trail, but at the moment, a huge section is just closed indefinitely, and that sucks. So c’mon People for Bikes. Let’s get that trail (and others like it across the US) open again!

Posted in Environmental Causes, Health and Vitality | Leave a comment