As cruel as Mother Nature can sometimes be, it’s often the kindness of the average human that balances the world out. Dealing with a natural disaster is a communal effort, as the damage these disasters cause is usually more than one can handle on their own. Whether it happens next door to you or very far away, it’s discouraging to feel like you can’t reach out and make a difference for those affected by the disaster. Here’s how you can help natural disaster victims in meaningful ways that can get them back on their feet.
Raise Funds for Relief
Despite the collective desire to help, everything costs something, even when we wish it didn’t. Money is one of the most useful things you can donate in the wake of a natural disaster, but if you don’t personally have the funds available, you can look for other ways to help through fundraising efforts. Or you can even donate used clothing and household items to a local GreenDrop. If you choose to do so, that donation could be converted into funds for The American Red Cross.
Determine the Right Donations
If you want to help natural disaster victims through donations, you absolutely can. There is one caveat that you need to be aware of. It’s common after a natural disaster that people will donate whatever they can in the hopes that it will be helpful. This can lead to wasted resources and more effort on the part of relief workers in the area. Reach out to agencies that you want to donate to and find out what supplies are actually needed. Your donation will go a lot further when it’s something that not many people think of donating.
Donate Blood
Natural disasters don’t just affect property and possessions; it’s the people directly harmed by the disaster that need the most help. A great way to be of assistance is to donate blood if you can. Through your donation, you may just end up saving someone’s life who’s in desperate need of aid. The affected area often gets a lot of medical supplies from government and assistance agencies, but blood is something they can’t make in a factory.
Gather More Support
As we’ve mentioned, providing support to those affected by a natural disaster is a collective effort. The more people want to help, the sooner the problems in the area can be dealt with. It can be difficult to make a large impact on your own, which is why you should try and drum up more support from others to help you out. If you can convince even one more person to help, you’ve doubled the good you can do for those affected.
If you want to help support those who need it, GreenDrop can help. Consider a used clothing donation in Franklin Mills. Your donation could be converted into money to provide general funding for the American Red Cross which provides disaster relief efforts.
Old item donations are great because they allow you to give things to those who need them more than you. You can get rid of possessions you don’t use. However, not everything you might want to get rid of is useable, and you need to consider what you donate carefully. You don’t want to create extra work for those who sort through donations and find things that don’t belong. We’ll give you a few common items you should never donate to charity because they tend to become unusable in the long run.
Unusable Clothing
While clothing of all kinds frequently finds its way into our donation bins, there’s a limit to what you can donate. Not all clothes are fit for a donation. Specifically, you want to avoid any clothes that simply aren’t usable anymore. Large stains, big rips, tears, holes, missing buttons—all of these things make clothing much less attractive as a donation option. Consider recycling these clothes instead, as they won’t be of much use to someone who wants to wear them.
Recalled Items
One common item type you should never donate to charity is anything that has a recall or a safety concern regarding it. An example of this is a malfunctioning children’s car seat. You wouldn’t want to inadvertently put anyone else in danger by providing them with a defective product. Most charities can’t take these items anyway.
Older Electronics
Older electronics, including televisions, computers, and phones, aren’t ideal donations for a couple of different reasons. In some cases, older electronics have hazardous materials inside them that many charities can’t redistribute. In other cases, the technology is too old to be useful anymore and won’t actually do people any good. The best thing to do with old electronics is to take them to an e-waste recycler for proper recycling.
Mattresses
It might seem like a good idea to try and provide another bed for someone to sleep on when you get a new mattress in your room. While the sentiment is understandable, mattresses come with a host of problems that make them difficult to reuse. A large part of this lies in sanitary concerns, and mattresses can hide many things that could cause harm to another person.
GreenDrop knows you want to give in the most effective way possible. If you have donations for the St. Vincent De Paul Society, we can facilitate those donations to make the biggest impact. Give us a call for more information on how you can help.
So many tasks can pop up when it comes time to move and a lot of them can slip through the cracks if you’re not careful. You could make the moving process much more difficult for yourself if you don’t know how to handle it. In order to make the move a little easier, it’s a good idea to donate as many of your old possessions as you can so you don’t have to deal with them. We’ll show you the reasons to donate your old stuff before you move and how it can make your move much simpler.
A Cheaper Cost of Moving
If you need to move a lot of furniture and other possessions, you’ll likely need to pay movers to help. That’s why it’s a good idea to separate the things you want to donate from what you want to keep. One of the reasons you should donate your old stuff before you move is because it reduces the total amount of items you have to pack and move into your new house. With less stuff to move from one place to the next, you can save money by getting a smaller truck or paying for less labor to transport your things.
A Fresh Start
Chances are that you moved to a new house for an important reason. Relocating for work, downsizing, better schools for the kids—whatever the reasons are, you’re starting somewhere new. You don’t want your new home to feel exactly like your old one; otherwise, you wouldn’t have moved. So, don’t make it look the same with all your things from before. When you donate your old possessions, you give yourself the chance to start over fresh with a new look for your home.
Simplify Your Move
This is an especially big deal if you aren’t hiring movers to do the work for you. You’ll have a lot of boxes and furniture to haul. There’s no escaping the reality that you have to pack and unpack all your possessions into your new house. So, get rid of as much as possible before you move. Donations are a great way to get rid of things you don’t want or need.
Recoup Costs Through Taxes
Moving is expensive; it’s an unfortunate fact of life. If you know you’ll spend a lot of money moving your things to a new home, it can help ease your mind if you have a few ways to get some of that money back. Large charitable donations are the perfect way to do something kind while also getting a kickback on your taxes for the next year. Those tax breaks can make up some of the losses you incurred from expenses related to your move.
To make your move easier, consider a clothes donation in Laurel, MD to GreenDrop. We can help you get that fresh start and do some good along the way.
Sometimes, it can seem like clutter pops up all over the place for no reason at all. In truth, there are places that logically make the most sense for why they have lots of clutter. When you know about these areas and do your best to keep them clean, you’ll find that your whole house feels more organized. We’ll give you some of the most common clutter hotspots in the home to be aware of so that you can stay vigilant about not adding to piles of stuff that you find there.
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If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s how important it is to take care of people who may need a little bit of help. Going out of our ways to make someone else’s life a little easier is one of the most selfless things we can do. However, giving back to others isn’t just good for those on the receiving end. Helping other people can actually help the giver in a variety of ways as well. You’ll reap tangible and intangible benefits from doing something out of the kindness of your heart for someone else.
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