Donors can go to website to find needy families

— -- Chasity Robinson was up against it this time last year. The Denham Springs, La., mom was hospitalized with her newborn son, James Jr., and her husband, James Sr., was missing work to care for their two special needs older children.

"It was real tough on us," says Robinson, 25.

With the wolf at the door, Robinson turned to an innovative new website business run by a Palo Alto, Calif., attorney and the son of civil rights pioneer Andrew Young. The site, GiveLocally.net, allows people who need emergency help getting food or paying the electric bill to tell their stories; donors read those stories and make donations targeted for specific individuals or families.

For Robinson, one donor gave more than $200, another, more than $100. "That helped pay the electric bill and the heating bill when they would have been cut off," she says. "We fell on hard times, really."

Attorney Brad Newman, 41, started GiveLocally a little more than a year ago. Bo Young, 38, an Atlanta entrepreneur, came on board late last year. They purposely chose not to be a non-profit.

"The philanthropic model needs to be more accountable, so we are accountable to our donors and our investors," Newman says. "We operate like a business. We operate as a Web start-up. Our product is to help people. Our mission is to do it efficiently."

Recipients are screened

For each dollar donated, 18 cents goes to administrative costs. The staff of about 20 full- and part-time employees and contractors thoroughly screens everyone who comes on the site seeking help.

Money is never given directly to the recipients; instead, they receive in-kind assistance: a voucher for groceries, a gas bill paid, an optometrist paid, etc.

In the past six months, about 850 people around the USA have donated tens of thousands in "micro-gives," and more than 200 families and individuals have been helped, Young says, adding that the process is slowed because of vetting.

"We're the only ones doing it this way right now," Newman says. "The online giving model is growing exponentially every year."

Young says he grew up watching his father and his late mother, Jean Young, help many people in their home.

"I don't really remember a time when we didn't have someone living with us who needed a place to stay," he says. "This gives me a way to carry on that tradition."

Unlike regular charities

Donors say they like the site because they can decide specifically whom they want to assist, and they know they won't get scammed. "The first thing that's different is you actually have faces to go with the asks," says Ryan Cameron, 45, a popular Atlanta radio personality who gives regularly through the site.

"A lot of times with charities, you kind of just put your money into a pot and hope they do the right thing," says Cameron, whose afternoon show airs on radio station WVEE. "Here, you know somebody's individual story. You know everybody's been pre-screened. You aren't just giving somebody some cash and hoping they do the right thing."

Cameron says his first "give" was to a grandmother from Georgia. "Because my grandmother raised me," he says, adding that he had just given $300 "a couple of days ago to a father who was out of work."

Like other donors, Cameron says he isn't bothered by the fact that his donations aren't tax-deductible. (Donations may also be made to non-profit groups on the site; those are tax-deductible.)