Vineyard nonprofits need your help

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Martha’s Vineyard would be a different place without its nonprofits. Each one of these organizations does something for you or for someone you know. Now, it’s the season to return the favor.

There’s something for everyone among fundraising events to benefit nonprofits, from the Vineyard Committee on Hunger’s bake sale under the Linden Tree in Vineyard Haven this weekend, to The FARM Institute’s Meals in the Meadow in July. And, what would the season be without the Possible Dreams auction that benefits Community Services, or M.V. Preservation Trust’s Taste of The Vineyard Gourmet Stroll?

TicketsMV.com, a MindshareMedia service, is an online calendar of fundraising events, arranged to help you keep track of a summer’s worth of worthy events. Browse the TicketsMV calendar, pick the events you’d like to attend, and click to buy tickets.

Coming June 24, The Times will publish Community Works, a special product dedicated to helping the nonprofits on which we depend to tell their stories and remind us all of the vital work each of them does. Community Works will include an expanded version of the TicketsMV.com calendar, with mid- and late-summer events, and messages from the nonprofits about their efforts to help Islanders, and the fundraising efforts they have planned to make it possible for you to help them.

It’s a mutual thing. We help them, and they help us. Consider last year’s example of the importance of just one – and not the most celebrated – of many Island nonprofits. When the MSPCA shut down the Vineyard animal shelter, because the statewide organization’s budget would not support the cost of the Vineyard operation, volunteers and donors met the challenge and opened a new Animal Shelter of Martha’s Vineyard, getting on with work that is important to so many Islanders.

“Nonprofit organizations are a vital part of our community. They work hard to provide much needed services that benefit all aspects of the Island, from people and places, to animals,” Peter Oberfest, The Times publisher, says. “Community Works helps get their messages out, both in the newspaper and on our website.”

There are many eager, generous Islanders ready to do the important work of nonprofits. It’s the season for us to give them the wherewithal with which to do it. Watch for Community Works to help you do your part.