Finding A Green Organization Near You

The planet is warming. The ice caps are melting. Polar bears are going homeless, and we're still spewing pollutants into the air. You see it every day. Smoke rising from the chimneys of Waterloo, Ontario homes, cars chugging along down the road, the sewage outflow pipe that feeds into the lake - a lake which your grandmother says was used for swimming when she was a kid, but which is now just a stagnant mess. It's hard not to notice what's happening, and even harder to let it go without doing anything, which is why there are so many green organizations springing up all over Canada and the rest of the world.

You may think there's nothing you personally can do, especially if you're not inclined toward engineering, chemistry or environmental science, but that's not the case. You don't have to have several years worth of research and development credits on your tax return to make a difference. If you've got some spare cash, even just a few dollars, it could really help out one of these organizations. And even if you don't have any spare cash, you have another valuable commodity you may not have considered: time.

So you've decided that you want to volunteer with or donate to a green organization. Now how do you find one? Do you look in the yellow pages before hotels and after foreign workers? Canada is an organized country. There's got to be some sort of listing system somewhere. After all, you don't want to pick just any organization with the word green or environment in the title. What if it's a for-profit organization out to scam money from environmentally-conscious old ladies, or the green means something else, like promoting marijuana?

In fact, there are a number of ways to locate legitimate green non-profit groups. The internet is always the best place to start a search, whether you're looking for a Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Attorney, California condor rehabilitation facility, or graduate program in Kinesiology. These days, almost all non-profit groups have websites that should be able to tell you what they're all about. Some things in particular to look for are the number they received from the government when they registered as a non-profit, so that you can be sure that they are legitimate, and their mission statement, so that you can make sure you agree with how they intend to spend your money.

If you don't have time to trawl the search engines for words like green and wind power you could always head over to the social networking site Facebook, where many organizations and non-profits have profiles that allow you to join online and ask members for more information. The Green Part of Canada, the nation's environmentally concerned political party, and the Government of Canada also keep lists of registered non-profit groups on their websites. If you don't have the internet but still don't want to leave your Whitby real estate during your search, for fear of contributing to the greenhouse gas problem, you could watch TV and look for ads from bigger groups like the World Wildlife Fund, or browse the yellow pages and call them directly for more information.