Companies are getting into blogging, why not non-profits? They are catching on and one of the organizations we talked about last year, DonorsChoose, is starting up a new "power of the blogs" campaign called, unsurprisingly, BloggersChoose. DonorsChoose allows teachers to submit proposals for classroom supplies or initiatives they want to accomplish but can't afford (shocking news - schools aren't well-funded, like, anywhere) and donors pick the ones they want to fund, in part or......

Sneaking in at the very end of Cinco de Mayo, we want to remind you about the Mexican Museum. It's their 30th anniversary this year and they're also gearing up to begin construction on a new, permanent, fancy home in Yerba Buena. Much of their current fundraising goes towards their capital campaign for this new building and they're approaching the $34 they'll need. Housed now at Fort Mason, the museum features more than 12,000......

Yeah, we know. You are soooooo busy and sooooo important. Shut up. Get out of the house and do something to make the world a better place. SFist Cares has had just about enough this week. Don't know where to start? Have we got a website for you: Volunteer Match. Just what it sounds like - you enter some search criteria like your location, your interests and potential dates, and out pops a list......

We know that Menlo Park might be a bit far for some of you to travel, but we thought you might want to know about a special showing of The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill at the Guild this Saturday, March 12th. Director Judy Irving and (human) star Mark Bittner will introduce the 7:00pm showing and answer questions after both the 4:55 and 7:00pm showings. But forget them - they'll also be bringing one of......

Keeping the city green and clean certainly is a challenge and some spaces do better than others. Trying to help is the San Francisco Clean City Coalition. Operating in the space between various community and neighbourhood organizations, the Coalition is focused on making the city pretty....

As you may be able to tell SFist Cares is really only kind of literate most of the time. Sure, we have some fancy college learnin' but we could always use some more help (bless you SFist copyeditor Jeremy for correcting our worst mistakes). We particularly love it when our readers correct us because you all are such smarty-pants! Well, yeah, smarty-pants? Put your time where your quick to comment fingers are and volunteer......

SFist Cares is a great, great feature, profiling various ways you can volunteer or give back to the Bay Area community. Plus, SFist Mary-Lynn's funny as all get out. Political Junkie, by contrast, is filled only with low-quality writing and schadenfreude. But darn it, just because we snicker doesn't mean we don't have a heart as well! So we urge you to give, give, give -- to Kevin Shelley's legal defense fund. Kevin Shelley is California's beleaguered secretary of state, who's beloved by millions, especially his staff. So how strange that the legal defense fund he started back in November 2004 should only have collected $250, from one donor. The one donor is Tony Miller, the Shelley employee who was in charge of running the program that's under attack for misusing federal funds (and was sent to testify before the State Senate in Shelley's stead a few weeks ago). Dude, that's like making your little brother buy your quota of stained-glass ornaments for the school band's sale drive out of his own allowance. Shelley claims he hasn't been able to raise money because he "hasn't had time during the past half-year to call people and ask for their assistance." Funny, that never seemed to have stopped him before. The Kevin Shelley Legal Defense Fund doesn't seem to have an online donation site, so no, we suppose they don't take Paypal. So send those checks, wadded-up five dollar bills, Safeway coupons, and free AOL CD-ROMs straight to Sacramento -- remember, every cent counts -- and every political junkie cares. ...

The above photo, from a series by Your Waitress, is of HiMY SYeD placing candles as part of his art piece and vigil to commemorate the one month point since the horriffic tsunami in the Indian Ocean. SFist also posted the personal story and photographs of Wyatt Gallery, who recently returned from the scene of the disaster in Sri Lanka. SFist Cares explores the rules relating to your 2004 tax return and your charitable......

SFist has seen our traffic spike since the change in calendars, setting a new record for sessions in a 24 hour period on Tuesday. We'd like to think that it's because of the incredible popularity of our SFist Cares feature (it should be), but we have a feeling it's because we've taken the WULAD approach to increasing our readership -- Britney Spears' baby, anyone? Speaking of which, this weekend marks the anniversary of Roe......

SFist Cares is going to tread a bit on the turf of SFist Watches: Movies and tell you about something you can do to support a good cause and still sit on your ass all weekend. Rock on. Artists' Television Access is presenting the Amnesty International Mini Film Festival, running this Saturday and Sunday. Films are $5 each, the price just covering the event itself. Cheap and requires no effort on your part whatsoever.......

Obviously this is a time when there are some major needs in the world where you are inclined to send your money. We don't want to overwhelm you with pleas for donations. But SFist Cares will continue on weekly because far away, or close to home, there are hard-working and valuable organizations that need your help. When SFist was a little kid - in our short pants and pigtails - we loved school. All the......

Shortly after the terrible tsunami in the Indian Ocean, SFist Mary-Lynn put together a great SFist Cares feature. But as the extent of suffering has begun to become fully apparent, we felt that we weren't necessarily doing enough. The scale of this tragedy will probably not be matched in our lifetimes. At least we sure hope not. Of course, we're not George Bush, so we don't have $10,000, or two weeks presidential pay, to offer......

SFist Cares tries to focus on local issues and local charities. But when there are more than 44,000 people dead, thousands more missing, and millions homeless that's something that affects us not as San Franciscans, but as humans. So forgive us this once for going beyond our own borders and our own needy and asking you to help these people around the other side of the globe. By now, only rock-dwellers haven't heard about the......

This is the time of year when it seems you can't go for fifteen minutes without having to pull out your wallet for something. And by the 23rd, we figure you're probably really desperate and buying complete crap (Unless, of course, it's SFist Schwag which says Happy Festivus like nothing else.) just to have something under the tree. Additionally, the Christmas season is when charities really see a rise in giving and take the opportunity......

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