I grew up in a poor, rural area of Michigan. My family was thoroughly middle class, but the houses immediately surrounding us were not quite. Some people in a quarter mile were down at or below the poverty line. As a result, my parents used to pay for semi truck from the local food bank to come out to our rural township hall so that people wouldn't have to make a 40 minute drive into the nearest small city to get the food they needed. This was quite a bit more effective than simply giving canned goods to the pantry, since they generally have a surplus and can get more at bulk rates as seconds or dented items from the warehouses for less than you can pay even on sale at the grocery store, but they don't have the money or necessarily the knowledge of where the truckload delivery would do the most good. Unfortunately, the township no longer wants to host and run that handout day anymore, so we no longer can. I'd like to see more community oriented, local charity like that, but I'm honestly not sure how to make it happen, especially now that I live in a larger, more affluent metro-region and further away from where I can directly see the need.

Otherwise, I donate to the Institute for Justice because I have yet to see a case of theirs that I wasn't entirely behind.