GiveBIG challenge is underway

Today is your chance to donate to Ballard charities and have your money go further.

The Seattle Foundation is hosting the “GiveBIG” challenge from 7 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. to support a number of charities, including the Ballard Food Bank, the Nordic Heritage Museum and Groundswell NW. The money donated to charities through GiveBIG will be “stretched” by $500,000.

Here is how the “stretch pool” and match works:

Credit card donations made during this time period will be counted as GiveBIG donations and used to calculate distribution of the stretch pool. The amount of a nonprofit organization’s share of the stretch pool will be based on the percentage of donations the nonprofit receives of the total online contributions made through www.seattlefoundation.org on June 23. In other words, distribution of the stretch pool will be pro-rated. If X organization receives 1% of the donations through our site on GiveBIG, they will receive 1% of the stretch pool dollars.

Here is the long list of charities that are participating. There will also be a Golden Ticket given away every hour. Donors will be chosen at random to have more money donated to the charity they chose to support. Most tickets are worth $1,000 but the one-time extra special Golden Ticket is worth $5,000.