My Nonprofit Reviews

This is a charitable organization that I can really get behind. They focus on people who have fallen on the wrong side of the fine line that keeps many families from becoming homeless for lack of rent, jobless when faced with sudden, unaffordable car repairs, and in dire straits because of unexpected medical bills - in short, any of the rest of us, but for the grace of God. They vet all the requests for help the same way I would if I had the time and the resources to ensure that the request for assistance is accurate, and they ensure that the payments go straight to the landlords/repairmen/medical facilities so that the contributions are correctly applied. They ensure that the help that donors provide is directed to the needs of real people, with real short-term needs, who would otherwise fall in the gaps of larger social-support efforts.

Modest Needs has my unqualified recommendation for people wanting to make a real difference in the lives of others.

I am a monthly contributor to Modest Needs. They are very efficient with applying donations to needs, and they epitomize the starfish principle: you can't save all the world's beached starfish, but you can help the one that you return to the ocean, where it can thrive. This isn't going to solve the world's problems, but it can - and does - solve the problems that a single person or a single family has, through no fault of their own when there's a temporary break in the paycheck-to-paycheck existence of so many Americans. Modest Needs addresses just what the name implies - people who need a very modest amount to sustain them through a difficult period in their lives.

You alone cannot end pandemic war, world hunger, or systematic genocide, but you alone CAN make an existential difference in one family's life with just a few dollars at the right time.