2022 Humanist Global Charity Annual Report

The primary feature of HGC 2022 was an accumulation of new partners worldwide with an expansion of projects into 22 different nations. Dozens of schools, safe houses, refugee camps, and humanist cooperatives received assistance from our generous donors. A month-by-month record of the allocations can be viewed HERE.

Below is a brief synopsis of activity in each nation we served, with reporting on our major projects in each location.

UGANDA received $30,082, maintaining its position as the biggest benefactor of HGC giving in the last nine years. Our money went primarily to five different organizations: Pearl Vocational Training College, Top Care Humanist Nursery School. Eagle’s View Humanist Primary School, ShelterMi Humanist Safe House & Orphanage, and to several humanist women’s collectives (Ruwenzori, Kabughobe, Katuruna). HGC also delivered funds to a humanist secondary student with albinism, for use in her educational needs. Notable HGC achievements in Uganda include funding a classroom, latrine, and banana farm for Eagle’s View, constructing an orphanage dormitory, a water well, and an e-book of testimonies for ShelterMi, and allocations for a watermelon farm, a sewing project, and a coffee threshing project, to the humanist collectives.

INDIA in only its second year of HGC funding, received $14,471. Four secular schools were provided with money for food, computers, clothes, sanitary pads, teacher salaries, and school equipment: Apna School in Bihar State, Birsa School in Jharkhand, Sikshit School in Uttar Pradesh, and Everybody’s School in New Delhi. HGC also provided school supplies for the Kalbelia (untouchable) in Pushkar, for children in a scavenger dump in New Delhi, and for children of sex workers in Kerala. Additionally, we gave Shreya Pandey, an impoverished secondary student in Uttar Pradesh, enough funding to successfully enroll in college as a computer science major, and we funded a watermelon project in Bihar that planted seeds in 2,000 mounds on 3 rented riverfront acres.

NIGERIA was given $11,175 in HGC funding for projects in multiple areas. In Maiduguri (Borno State) we constructed shelter for 120 abandoned street kids, to keep them warm in the winter, and we sponsored the education of numerous orphan girl. In Benue State and Niger State refugee camps we provided medical interventions for polio, skin diseases, measles, hepatitis, urinary tract infection, parasitic worms, and polio. In Benue State we also planted a “humanist garden” of corn, yam, and peanuts. In Niger State we continued the valuable service of our Humanist Hotline, we offered a workshop on sex education for secondary school students, and we provided travel funds to our representatives to visit Mubarak Bala in Abuja Prison. (Mubarak was the HGC partner in Nigeria 2.5 years ago, until he was arrested for “disturbing the peace” i.e., criticizing Islam on Facebook.

NEPAL received $5,610, issued to our wonderful allies: Atheist Republic Nepal (ARP) and Nepal Association of Secular Humanists (NASH). Our funding there was given primarily to a Kathmandu orphanage (for food, warm clothes, and vocational training), to Safe House for Women, and to Literacy School for Women (who were not allowed education as children).

MEXICO, a new recipient of HGC funding, received $3,000. Two indigenous tribes in Oaxaca state (Trique and Heuve) received funding to alleviate poverty and market their traditional crafts. Five craftswomen in Baja del Sur were given funding to support their businesses. A LGBT-friendly student (Rodrigo) was given funding for educational support. Funds were also sent to a Mayan group in Chiapas, and $140 was handed out to indigenous street beggars in Oaxaca city.

BANGLADESH got $2,880 for impoverished widows and widowers (to start businesses; often sewing machines or rickshaws) and to orphans (cash for tuition, school supplies, food, and clothing)

MYANMAR received $1,900 for a variety of causes, suggested to us by the Burmese Atheist Association. HGC delivered fund to a refugee camp school, an orphanage, a senior home, and a safe house, plus we provided funds for a fish farm (to feed a village in the war zone) and to a mutual aid group to continue their free food distribution to impoverished people in a Yangon suburb.

AMERICAN INDIAN (INDIGENOUS) groups were given $1,800. Money for a food pantry at the American Indian Center in Kansas City was provided; other allocations include a community garden facilitated by Chi-Nation in Chicago; car repair funds for Mothers Against Meth Alliance on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, and travel funds for South Sound Street Medics in Tacoma, Washington - they deliver medical aid to reservations up to 2,000 miles away.

ZAMBIA earned $1,355. Funds went to a variety of humanist businesses and farms, plus sanitary pads were delivered to rural school girls, and orphans were sponsored for school tuition.

AFGHANISTAN was given $1,330. Funds were allocated to pay the hospital bill of an atheist who was stabbed in the street by a Taliban member. Additionally, a refugee in Pakistan and two refugees in Iran were sent money to buy food, and a “secret school” run by older students teaching younger students, was given money to rent a facility.

TANZANIA received $1,190 to buy for water well for their garden that is growing Beet Root, a plant that alleviates the symptoms of sickle cell anemia. Funds were also spent sponsoring orphan girl education, and providing equipment to an LGBT Netball team.

KENYA earned $1,027 for its HGC Fruit Orchard, for its humanist students, entrepreneurs, and women’s collectives, and for a computer education system delivered to Humanist Orphan Centre (co-sponsored by HGC and Center for Inquiry).

APPALACHIA got $490 in funding for its monthly Appalachia Community Dinner in Berea, Kentucky, and a humanist autistic student received a tablet and iPhone from HGC to pursue her graphic arts education online.

USA (NON-APPALACHIA) got $465 for a homeless garden in Santa Cruz, California; for the Peaceful Seeds Community Garden, in Greensboro, North Carolina; and for a progressive scouting camp for at-risk girls in Richmond, California.

MOROCCO received $475 to help impoverished students buy school supplies, and to promote feminist and LGBT activism

PALESTINE got $300 to teach computer literacy to children in a refugee camp in the West Bank.

THE PHILIPPINES received $400 for their humanist library and a humanist video production business.

PERU was given $395 for Peru Atheist Association to deliver school supplies to a Lima slum, for for publishing the e-book Inventing god

SRI LANKA received $335 to help humanists set up a street food business and to enable the college education of a humanist student

UNITED KINGDOM received $311 - this went to Dan Beaton, to provide free housing in London to Uganda humanist refugee Namylo Viola.

SAUDI ARABIA humanists got $100 in funding from HGC; it was donated to support a “Saudi Pride” contingent at a LGBTQ+ event in three European cities.

SOMALIA - HGC delivered $25 to a Somalian humanist refugee in Athens, Greece

YEMEN - HGC delivered $25 to a Yemenite humanist refugee in Athens, Greece

Total Allocations $78,776

HGC goals in 2023 are to maintain its strong alliances in at least 12 of these nations, and to add Turkey LGBTQ+ as a recipient. Additionally, our plan is to allocate our charity more equitably, with perhaps 10 nations receiving at least $5,000 and no nation receiving more than $10,000.

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Total Administration Costs $11,011

$41 banking & wiring fees

$243 postage & shipping (electronics to India and Appalachia)

$331 taxes, tax preparation

• $50 for Tax Preparation Assistance (1099)

• $20 filing fee with the California Secretary of State

• $75 Filing fee with California Attorney General, Registry of Charitable Trusts

• $75 Filing fee with California Attorney General, Registry of Charitable Trusts (systems glitch)

• $10 Filing fee with Franchise Tax Board (California Tax Form 199)

• $101 Online filing service for sending in Form 990-EZ (online service required by IRS)

$36 computer equipment

$14 maps

$99 phone

$134 t-shirts

$88 consultations & fundraising subscriptions

$542 website (Squarespace & GoDaddy)

$1,200 travel expenses for Phil Zuckerman (freethought conferences in Kentucky, Denmark, and Denver)

$2,175 travel expenses for Hank Pellissier (visiting donors in Ireland, France, Germany, and providing funds to recipients in Todos Santos (Mexico) and Oaxaca (Mexico)

$6,108 fundraising stipend to Hank Pellissier (he gets 10% of all funding earned through monthly campaigns)

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$78,776 allocations to recipients

$11,011 administrative costs

$89,787 Total Expenses

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Total Income $72,521

$37,198 - donations from website

$2,680 - donations from PayPal

$2,090 - donations from Momentum

$3,221 - donations from Benevity

$357 - donations from Amazon Smile

$730 - donations from Facebook

$400 - donations from Bright Funds

$25,840 - donation checks from Fidelity Charitable, etc.

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difference is -$17,266 (HGC spent more than it earned)

two reasons exist for lower donations in 2022

1. HGC no longer serves as a conduit to Kasese Humanist Schools, due to its own decision - KHS generates $25,000-$30,000 in donations per year. If HGC was still the middleman, our total income would be around $100,000

2. HGC usually receives around $30,000-$35,000 from 3-4 big donors in January or December of each year. In 2022 this did not occur because one big donor donated on December 31, 2021 and then later on January 10, 2023 - they skipped 2022 entirely. Another big donor donated $25,000 in 2021, with the intention that it should be distributed in 2022 and 2023. So - HGC normally would have received an additional $22,500 in 2022, but it didn’t. If it had, 2022 would have been a record-setting year in fundraising.