A booth for the Copper Shores Community Health Foundation at the Copper Country Mall advertises for GivingTuesday. (Photo provided)

Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday are done and gone. The focus of this week was GivingTuesday, sponsored locally by the Copper Shores Community Health Foundation.

Michael Babcock, director of communications and donor relations at Copper Shores, calls it a way for people to put the commercialism behind them and get back into the holiday spirit of giving.

“After the ultra-capitalism events of the weekend, we want people to get back to thinking about what matters in this world, and it’s not just shopping,” he said.

On Tuesday, more than 20 nonprofits who benefit from the 50 causes supported by Copper Shores brought representatives, handouts and displays to GivingTuesday Live at the Copper Country Mall. There they informed people about their organizations and the work they do. People who visited the event had the opportunity to learn and to donate to the nonprofit of their choice or to Copper Shores to use their donation where it is needed most.

“Our community is an amazing place to live and work and play and raise a family,” Babcock said. “But we often don’t see that the reason it’s so good is all the invisible work that the nonprofits in our community do. They support the full cycle of life, from the day a baby is born to the day a person passes away. When a baby born here is less than one day old, the nonprofit Family Resource Center is there with parenting information and advice, and when life is ending, Omega House stands ready to help them pass as comfortably and gracefully as possible.”

Local nonprofits here support people in every phase of their life, Babcock says. “Almost everyone’s life is touched by these nonprofits, often in ways they aren’t even aware of,” he said. “GivingTuesday is a chance to realize their impact and thank them, to put our money where our heart is.

“People who can’t donate financially can still give their time. Visitors to the mall event learned of many volunteer opportunities.

GIVINGTUESDAY CAUSES

Omega House was one of the nonprofits at the mall, where Omega House’s Michael Lutz says many people stopped to pick up information and share their memories about family members who have passed away at Omega House.

“All the donations received through GivingTuesday go right back to the community by helping someone who doesn’t have the financial resources to afford the daily rate at Omega House,” said Lutz, executive director of the hospice and respite care facility in Houghton. “Donations help those less fortunate be able to reside at Omega House, regardless of their financial situation. At Omega House, we turn no one away due to inability to afford our services.”

The Wolf-Moose Foundation is another organization supported by GivingTuesday donations. As the nonprofit partner of the long-running wolf-moose research project on Isle Royale, the foundation raises funds to help keep the project going.

The wolf-moose project, launched in 1958, has led to groundbreaking discoveries in ecology, but funding challenges have made sustaining its operations increasingly difficult each year, says Rolf Peterson, a director of the foundation and professor emeritus at Michigan Tech. The foundation supports critical activities like aerial surveys, field equipment maintenance and sample analysis.

According to Peterson, the Wolf-Moose Foundation was formed one year ago, so this is the first year it has participated in GivingTuesday. Peterson ran the wolf-moose project for decades. The foundation’s first priority, he says, is to enable more individuals and the private sector to support the world’s longest-running predator-prey study, as well as advancing carnivore conservation.

Funds raised by the foundation will be passed through through a new endowment fund at the Michigan Tech Fund. 

“Increased public support will help meet ongoing costs as federal support for long-term wildlife research such as the wolf-moose project faces a future of flat or declining budgets,” Peterson said.

GivingTuesday is a worldwide movement sponsored by a nonprofit called GivingTuesday that promotes what it calls radical generosity.

“We want to reimagine a world built upon shared humanity and generosity,” says their website.

Since it was established in 2012, millions of people have donated on GivingTuesday, and major funders like the Gates Foundation support the movement.

Copper Shores brought GivingTuesday to the Keweenaw eight years ago.

“We were an early adopter,” Babcock said.

In addition to donations received at the mall on Tuesday, people were able to donate online.

It takes a while to tally all the GivingTuesday donations, but as of midnight Tuesday, Copper Shores had processed 1,168 donations totaling $485,891.

SHARING MEALS, SHARING THE LOVE

Copper Shores Meals on Wheels program is also participating in the 2024 Subaru Share the Love project. In partnership with Meals on Wheels America, Subaru of America, Inc. and its retailers have pledged to donate a minimum of $300 to a charity like Copper Shores Meals on Wheels for every new vehicle leased or sold from Nov. 21 to Jan. 2, 2025.

This is the third year that Copper Shores Meals on Wheels is participating in Share the Love. Funds from the project will help Meals on Wheels continue to fight senior hunger and isolation in the Copper Country.