UP IT GiVE

FOR THESE LIFE-CHANGING CHARITIES

Whether you are a natural giver — one of those noble souls who prefers presenting to receiving gifts — or a more average Joe, for whom a small altruistic gesture just feels good, we’ve listed several charities that make a difference in our neighborhood. Any of them could benefit from a tad of your time or money.

The Mission

Oak Cliff-based Promise House supports homeless and at-risk youth in Dallas. The nonprofit, founded by Lovers Lane United Methodist Church in the early 1980s, runs an emergency shelter for homeless, runaway and abandoned kids ages 10-17. Promise House also runs a transitional living program for youths ages 16-24, wherein residents are given time and support to obtain education and learn to be independent, productive adults. A Promise House shelter for otherwise homeless single mothers, their children and pregnant women ages 14-20 offers up to two years of housing, childcare and community support. Promise House has a new shelter under construction, the Street Outreach Shelter, which will be the only shelter in Dallas specifically for ages 18-24.

How To Give

Promise House has come up with several creative means of year-end giving. Send them your holiday card list, and they will create cards, address them and mail them for $10 per card. Promise House also accepts gift cards to use as giveaways at fundraising events or to use for residents’ emergency needs. Even if you can’t spend much money, there are fun volunteer opportunities at the shelters — host a cookie-decorating party, show a holiday movie, lead a craft project, teach a music lesson or pitch another idea to help brighten up shelter life.

Here are ways cash donations could work for Promise House:

• $25 buys a holiday gift for a homeless child

• $50 supplies a month of diapers to a newborn baby

• $100 provides a new winter coat to a teen mother and her child

• $250 feeds up to 16 youths for a week

• $500 buys all the school supplies for Promise House youth for one year

• $1,000 gives a homeless youth 14 days of shelter from the streets

• $5,000 buys all the major appliances for the new Street Outreach Shelter

• $10,000 fully furnishes the new Street Outreach Shelter