Schuette announces new online charity database

LANSING--Attorney General Bill Schuette today announced the launch of a free online service that provides expanded information on charities and professional fundraisers who solicit donations in Michigan. The new searchable database, AGCharitySearch, will assist prospective donors, members of the media, grant-making foundations, and other interested citizens in locating and evaluating specific charities. The database will also help charities to monitor their annual registration status with the Attorney General's office. ''Even in difficult economic times, Michigan citizens and businesses continue to display remarkable generosity in their support of charitable organizations,'' said Schuette. ''We want to help citizens make informed choices by providing access to recent information about charities they are considering supporting.'' The new service allows online access to information derived from reports filed with the Attorney General by charities and their fundraisers. At www.michigan.gov/AGCharitySearch, visitors are able to quickly and easily confirm that a charity is currently registered to solicit donations in Michigan and to generate a detailed report on the charity that includes: Its charitable purpose; * Recent reported financial data reported by the charity; * Its federal tax-exempt status; for example, whether the IRS has granted an exemption as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization; * Contact information; and * When and where it was created. In addition to searching for particular charities, prospective donors are also able to perform general searches for various types of registered charities. For instance, donors may search by key words within the organization's purpose, as well as by city, county, state, name, or any combination of these. Charities soliciting donations in Michigan will also be able to use AGCharitySearch to confirm that their registration submissions have been received by the Attorney General's Charitable Trust Section and to verify that a particular professional fundraiser is properly licensed to conduct charitable solicitations in Michigan. The Attorney General's office has the primary responsibility for ensuring charitable assets are being used for the purpose for which they were donated and that organizations are acting as responsible stewards of these assets. To fulfill this mandate, the Charitable Trust Section registers charitable trusts, licenses charities to solicit funds, monitors charitable assets, and oversees any changes that may occur in a charitable entity's form or existence. The Charitable Trust Section also serves as an important repository of publicly available information about charities, and protects citizens from illegal scams posing as legitimate charities. For more information on the Attorney General's oversight of charitable solicitation in Michigan, visit www.michigan. gov/agcharities. Copyright © 2011 State of Michigan Published: Mon, Apr 25, 2011