FISHER HOUSE - HELPING MILITARY FAMILIES

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End-of-year tax planning prompts a flurry of charitable donations each year. This year's donations will be particularly important. That is because charitable giving has slowed recently after several years of record gains.

One of four Fisher House facilities at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas.

Giving last year rose 4.3% to $67.5 billion, trailing the 2005 increase of 13%, according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy's annual survey of 400 charities. It was the smallest increase since 2003, when cash and in-kind donations rose 2.3%.

Here are five groups that address the growing concern among donors that their dollars be used as effectively as possible, while finding creative solutions to helping people who don't always qualify for traditional types of aid.

Student Sponsor Partners. Most kids aren't academic superstars, but everybody needs a quality education, especially those whose families are struggling financially. Wall Street executive Peter Flanigan founded Student Sponsor Partners in 1986 to provide a private-school education and one-on-one mentoring to New York City kids who don't qualify for the scholarships that target straight-A students.

Most kids in the program come from single-parent households with an average annual income of $10,000 per capita or less. They are recommended by educators or others, and earn average or below test scores. Sponsors contribute toward funding a free high-school education, and often provide one-on-one guidance as well. Nearly all students who graduate from the program -- about 93% -- have gone on to college including Columbia University and Boston College. Sponsors say they like the program because it also allows graduates to become role models for others.

Fisher House Foundation. Due to advances in medicine and technology, more soldiers are surviving catastrophic injuries. But that has created a huge number of Iraq and Afghan war veterans needing long-term rehabilitation. Fisher House Foundation, which built its first facility in 1991, is a place where families affected by these and other injuries can come together and heal. Fisher House raises money to build group homes adjacent to military and VA hospitals for the families of service people who are being treated for all kinds of combat wounds, illnesses or injuries. The families stay rent free. The average length of stay is from 45 to 60 days, but some families have stayed as long as a year and a half.

The late Zachary Fisher, a real-estate mogul, and his wife, Elizabeth, launched the program in 1990, spending about $20 million in personal funds to build the first 24 houses. Today, there are 38 houses in all, five more under construction and plans to build 16 more over the next four years. The future projects will cost about $75 million. Including current pledges, they still need to raise about $38 million.

Hudson Link for Higher Education. Spurred on by the rising cost of locking up a burgeoning prison population and the goal of helping prisoners who want to help themselves, Hudson Link for Higher Education , based in New York, raises private funds for teaching college courses to prisoners locked up at nearby Sing Sing.

Since 1994, when federal funding for such programs was cut off amid a get-tough climate in crime, the U.S. prison population has grown nearly 50% to about 2.2 million. During the last 20 years, prison costs have jumped more than sixfold to over $63 billion a year. Numerous studies have shown that education can be a cost-effective way of keeping ex-cons from committing more crimes.

Many graduates of such programs go into social work to help other ex-cons make the transition back to society. Hudson Link's executive director, former Sing Sing inmate Sean Pica, was released in 2002 after serving 17 years for killing his girlfriend's father.

Fountain House. Many people battling major mental illnesses are able to live independent lives when they have access to the right kind of support, including a community of friends dealing with similar issues. Fountain House was founded in 1948 by former patients of Rockland State Hospital in New York and two wealthy volunteers, Elizabeth Schermerhorn and Hetty Richard, to help make such services available to folks other than just the very well-off.

The main building, located on Manhattan's West Side, serves as a clubhouse that members help run, along with professional staff. There, they can gather to take workshops in art, gardening or finance -- or just relax and visit. A second facility, a 477-acre farm in Montague, N.J,. is being expanded -- partly with funds from insurance executive Peter Lewis -- to include a "wellness center" where members can take yoga, tai chi and nutrition classes. � � � �

The Modest Needs Foundation. By a quirk of the tax code meant to discourage fraud, it's difficult to give direct aid to individuals who are struggling to make ends meet.

The Modest Needs Foundation, founded in 2002 by former English professor Keith Taylor, fills this void by giving small grants to assist people who have jobs but can't afford to pay unforeseen bills, such as car repairs or the cost of emergency medical care. The group does not give cash to the grant recipients, but pays their bills directly. Modest Needs has given away $2.59 million since 2002, with an average grant of about $600.

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