May 13, 2004 | Read Time: 1 minute
Federal employees, U.S. military personnel, and other government workers last year pledged $248.5-million — a record total — to the Combined Federal Campaign, the federal government’s annual charity drive.
The campaign raised 4.9 percent more than 2002’s total of $236.9-million, and also beat 2001’s $241.6-million total, the previous high-water mark for the fund-raising drive, said Mike Orenstein, spokesman for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the federal office that oversees the campaign.
The office attributed last year’s increase in part to stricter accounting procedures the campaign adopted in the wake of news reports of questionable accounting practices at the United Way of the National Capital Area, in Washington. The charity had been operating the federal campaign in the metropolitan Washington area, where the largest percentage of pledges usually is generated.
After the United Way allegations, the federal government hired Global Impact, a nonprofit group in Alexandria, Va., to conduct the charity drive in the Washington area. Last year, Global Impact raised $50.7-million, a $3.5-million increase from 2002’s total of $47.2-million from the same geographic area.
Global Impact also supervises the campaign for federal employees abroad. Anthony De Cristofaro, a spokesman for the charity, estimated that the Combined Federal Campaign total would increase by about $500,000 once donations from U.S. soldiers in Iraq are tallied.
For more information about the campaign, see the Office of Personnel Management’s Web site at http://www.opm.gov/viewDocument.aspx?q=246.
