AT LEAST ACKNOWLEDGE MY CHRISTMAS GIFT FIRST.

Last year, I decided I'd had enough of eleemosynary institutions behaving like cable companies.

It's really annoying, so close to the end of the Festive Season, and before all of my Festive Season gift checks have even been cashed, to receive mailings labeled "Renewal Notice" or laid out in the form of a government notification, with a request for another contribution.

I'm considering reviewing my donation habits, in particular to reduce funding or end it completely, for any cause, no matter how meritorious, that engages in this form of official-looking begging.

In July of 2020, I put Habitat for Humanity on notice.  Their ratio of charitable works to swag is probably low, given their propensity for sending out note pads and offering to send stuffed animals to donors.  Naughty list, again, this year.

But the Salvation Army????  They do good works in DeKalb County, and I have seen socially distanced queues of people at their food pantry as the Pritzker maladministration continues.  I don't want to take them off the Christmas distribution list, but an "Annual Renewal Notice" complete with a return envelope with the glassine window for the return address to show through is precisely the kind of treating donors as people to be billed I'm objecting to.