About Philanthropy 400

THE U.S. CHARITIES that raised the most from private sources in 2008 collectively attracted $76-billion in donations last year, an increase of just 1 percent: The Chronicle's annual Philanthropy 400 listing.

EVEN THE BIGGEST GROUPS expect giving this year and next to be down significantly, especially among foundations and government agencies.

THE RECESSION has forced fund raisers to rethink their approach to seeking major gifts, including lowering the amount they can expect a wealthy donor to give.

DONATIONS OF FOOD and other products to charities that distribute them to the poor have been slowed by the recession, just as other types of giving have.

THE AMERICAN NATIONAL RED CROSS, following a decade of management troubles and financial ups and downs, has taken steps to improve and stabilize its fund raising.

WHAT WORKED: How several charities among the Philanthropy 400 have achieved fund-raising success.

About Managing

A FORMER CHARITY REGULATOR, Marc Owens has become a thorn in the side of the IRS's nonprofit division, promoting a major overhaul of how the federal government oversees tax-exempt groups.

INVESTIGATIONS OF THE NAACP and other nonprofit entities show how "tone deaf" the Internal Revenue Service is on the issue of improper politicking by charities, Marc Owens says of his former employer.

RECENT IRS EFFORTS to monitor charities' governance activities go beyond the agency's legal authority, Marc Owens says, and put tax agents in the position of evaluating management decisions.

WITHIN THE IRS BUREAUCRACY, employees of the division that oversees tax-exempt groups have little influence, according to Marc Owens, a situation that can affect the quality of their work.

HIS AGENCY'S MISSION IS HOT right now, but Stephen Goldsmith, new interim board chair of the Corporation for National and Community Service, has his work cut out for him.

VIDEOCONFERENCES link doctors at the University of New Mexico with physicians in rural parts of the state, bringing sophisticated care to patients who normally have little access to it (Innovations).

NONPROFIT COMPENSATION and taxes on unrelated-business income were on the agenda at this year's meeting of the National Association of State Charity Officials.

THE SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE passed a measure that would allow small nonprofit groups to take a tax credit for providing health insurance to employees (Tax Watch).

THE INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE must do more to ensure that taxpayers who donate automobiles do not take unwarranted deductions, according to a report from a Treasury Department inspector general (Tax Watch).

THE IRS WEB SITE now carries a video and other materials designed to help charities understand the requirements of the new Form 990 (Tax Watch).

LAYOFFS AND BUDGET CUTS at nonprofit organizations: a sampling.

PEOPLE: Appointments and promotions in the nonprofit world.

About Fund Raising

BY 2020, more Americans will be millionaires and people will be ready to give again: Speakers at the national conference of the Partnership for Philanthropic Planning predicted better times ahead for fund raising.

HOW THE RICH GET RICHER, and happier: They give money to charity rather than spending it on big-ticket consumer items, according to a study by Thomas Stanley, who specializes in writing about the rich.

About Giving

GEORGE SOROS has promised $100-million for a new effort to combat climate change and will invest $1-billion in clean-energy technology.

THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC has received $10-million from the financier Henry Kravis to support a composer-in-residence and a prize for new music.

AMONG THE WINNERS of this year's Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy are several American philanthropists and a family in Turkey that operates one of Europe's private foundations.

MANY COMMUNITY FOUNDATIONS are using interactive and social-networking sites to create virtual "town squares" that connect local nonprofit groups with potential volunteers and donors.

THEIR NEW BOOK may be a love letter to the nonprofit world, but in The Art of Giving, Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey Solomon also offer practical, even hard-headed, advice.

HANDS-ON VOLUNTEERING and classroom learning prove a powerful combination for Alabama college students involved in an array of community-service projects (Lessons Learned).

THE FACE OF PHILANTHROPY: A St. Louis group is spreading awareness of prostate cancer at barbershops and other places where black men, who are most at risk for the disease, might listen to screening advice.

RECENT GRANTS by foundations, corporations, and other grant makers.

About Technology

ONE FOR THE BOOKS: A campaign that used Facebook, Twitter, and blogs to raise money for cancer charities set a Guinness World Record for the rapid spread of its message.

A WEB-BASED SYSTEM developed by a California charity provides people with a single place where they can determine their eligibility for a variety of social-service programs and apply for benefits electronically.

A NEW WEB SITE offers information and other resources related to the 2010 census to nonprofit organizations hoping to encourage their clients to participate in the count.

TECHNOLOGY BITS: A conference is being held in California for nonprofit-related software development; a Google site provides information on flu activity; TechSoup offers low-cost Windows upgrades to certain kinds of nonprofit groups.

About Nonprofit Careers

NOW A U.S. REPRESENTATIVE from Florida, Robert Wexler will bring to the presidency of the Center for Middle East Peace and Economic Cooperation the experience of seven terms in Congress (New on the Job).

Opinion: Leslie Lenkowsky teases out the lessons for philanthropy in the research of the new Nobel laureate in economics; Pablo Eisenberg pushes back against the conservative critics of Acorn and thinks nonprofit groups need to do the same; Mark Rosenman urges foundations to get creative about serving the greater good of society; Susan Colby and Susan Wolf Ditkoff say philanthropists must engage in some "truth-telling" about how effective their giving really is; James A. Phills Jr. reviews the latest book by Good to Great author Jim Collins, How the Mighty Fall.

Worth Reading: Good magazine lists the 100 people, organizations, and ideas that will change the world for the better.

New Books: A book by two veteran philanthropists to help donors, a guide for corporate grant makers, a handbook for small donors, and advice on getting a stalled capital campaign moving.