News Photo by Jason Ogden Northeast Michigan Community Foundation Finance Director DeeAnn Karos works through Giving Tuesday donations Wednesday. According to Marketing and Communications Director Christine Hitch, the organization exceeded last year’s donations by thousands.

ALPENA — Although they still were tabulating gift numbers Wednesday at the Community Foundation for Northeast Michigan, the organization beat last year’s collection amount of just over $30,000 during their second annual Giving Tuesday event.

CFNEM Marketing and Communications Director Christine Hitch said Wednesday the organization collected $31,038 in just online giving during the event but had more donations to tabulate.

Giving Tuesday is a worldwide event that more than $116 million last year from individuals, nonprofits and businesses since its inception three years ago.

The local event is organized by CFNEM, which began its drive last year. Patrons could go to the foundations website at www.cfnem.org and donate through the site to the nonprofit of their choice.

She said all of the nonprofits involved are in the foundation’s nine-county service area, which includes Alpena, Alcona, Montmorency and Presque Isle counties.

“The money that was raised for each nonprofit will go directly back to that organization,” Hitch said. “It was their choice whether they wanted us to cut a check or putting it into the endowment fund here.”

Some nonprofits hold their funding through the foundation, which allows interest to be collected on the funds, she said. The funds are then used to do projects through the nonprofits.

Hitch said this year there are more nonprofit organizations involved and more people giving.

She said last year 39 organizations collected funding; this year the number was 62 organizations. The groups had 24 hours to collect funding. The final number of donations, when calculated, will be added to the national total.

As of Wednesday staff were still tabulating donations that were brought into the organization’s Alpena offices, as well as distributing the collected funds.

“I expect (the donation number) to go up by a few thousand,” Hitch said. “We had quite a few people come in and drop off a gift.”

Hitch said with more organizations giving this year it helped make up the total that exceeded last year’s donations. She said one organization gave a gift of $10,000, and this year organizers were worried they would not exceed last year’s amount. But more people gave, albeit, in smaller amounts. She said many donations were in the $500-$1,000 range.

“Personally it was very heartwarming — knowing that we had that one huge gift last year — that we exceeded this year,” Hitch said. “It is pretty incredible and our nonprofits did a great job. Northeast Michigan is very generous.”

Jason Ogden can be reached via email at jogden@thealpenanews.com or by phone at 358-5693. Follow Jason on Twitter @jo_alpenanews. Read his blog, Sunny side up, with Jason at www.thealpenanews.com.