What’s your charity of choice?

When dealing with non-profit organizations there is always a risk your money doesn’t make it to the correct destination, so who should be held accountable?
Many people argue it is the government’s responsibility to strengthen the requirements for non-profit and charitable organizations. Others say it is the responsibility of individuals to guarantee the organization they are can be held accountable.
Gary Warren, founder of Quest Internacional, says the only way to guarantee the legitimacy of an organization is for people to be well informed about the organization and the people involved before making any contributions.
Warren has been involved in international development and numerous non-profit organizations for over 20 years, and says it is easy for organizations to mislead the public and money can easily go missing.
“All I needed to give [the government] was a piece of paper with a signature of the accountant who checked them,” he says. “ That was it, not even a record of where the money went, only a signature of the accountant who checked the books.”
This can be problematic. Imagine the accountant of a corrupt organization is a personal friend of the members involved, how difficult would it be to slip them a bill and get them to sign the books? Off to the government they go, no problems and the money is gone into the pockets of the wrong people.
Warren says it is not difficult for people to found non-profit organizations and says he has seen many go sour, which is why he founded his own.
“It is important to find organizations you trust, with a cause you support,” he says. Once you have done so, stick with them. When dealing with NGO’s and charities, it is far to simple to mislead the public and it can be common for money to go missing, depending on the organization.
As for the government’s role, demanding they strengthen policies for NGO’s and charities may seem like an obvious decision, but then who is going to make sure people are properly following these new standards? It is like a business, or personal taxes, the government has protocols people are suppose to follow, and they have people trying to catch those who don’t, but how many people a year still cheat on their taxes?
Warren says this is not the solution. If people are going to steal, they are going to continue stealing even if the government makes it harder.
The people who would suffer are those who are running legitimate and accurate organizations. People would have to spend more time keeping books and doing office work and would have less time to spend in the field working on their cause.
Also, if we ask the government to monitor different NGO’s and charities, how far do we allow them to interfere? Do we give them the right to appoint which countries we work in and which projects we do?
Although corrupt organizations do exist out there does not mean they all fall in this category. Regardless of the structure, finding an organization that you trust is the only way to guarantee legitimacy. Know the board members, volunteer, get involved.