As nonprofits ready for Giving Tuesday — one of the largest fundraising days of the year — some local leaders told GBH News that the financial help is even more needed as support overall slows.
Among them, organizers with Heal the Hood — a Jamaica Plain-based nonprofit that assists people with housing and food assistance — say they have seen a decline in total donations this year.
Derrel “Slim” Weathers, executive director of Heal the Hood, says the organization received $15,000 in individual donations in 2025, less than the year before, something he attributes to a rising cost of living.
Despite this, Weathers said more people have pitched in on a smaller scale.
“We’ve had an increase in community support,” he said. “We need a village and the village is us.”
The idea of Giving Tuesday was created as an annual global day of philanthropy, held the week after Thanksgiving in the United States. A nonprofit with a similar name was created in 2012.
Gabriella Snyder Stelmack, executive director of Bread of Life, a food security organization based in Malden, said she hopes that this week’s event will help her organization with much needed funds.
Stelmack doesn’t have detailed numbers of donations for this year. However, she said, many of the organization’s regular donors have had to rethink their personal philanthropy due to the state of the economy.
“There are some [donors] that have said, ‘I used to be able to give monthly.’ And I’ve seen a few emails in the past few weeks, as we’re closing down the year, that have said, ‘I’m not going to be able to continue this any longer,’” she said. “And that’s completely understandable.”
However, she says she too has seen an increase among some community members stepping up to fill the void.
“It makes you want to cry,'' she said. ”People care and they want to make a difference and they want to help their neighbors.”
