FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 5, 2008

MAYOR’S FUND TO ADVANCE NEW YORK CITY RECEIVES 4-STAR RATING FOR SECOND YEAR FROM CHARITY NAVIGATOR

For the second consecutive year the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City received a 4-star rating from Charity Navigator, America’s largest independent evaluator of charities. The ratings are based on organizational effectiveness and efficiency. Last August Charity Navigator also named the Mayor’s Fund #1 in its list of Top Ten “Slam-Dunk Charities,” out of over 5,000 non-profit organizations evaluated across the country.

“The Mayor’s Fund has exceeded our expectations and highlighted the importance of public-private partnerships,” said First Deputy Mayor Patricia E. Harris. “This recognition is a tribute the Mayor’s Fund board, staff, contributors and all of its City partners.”

“We appreciate Charity Navigator’s 4-star rating again for successfully managing our finances, and for noting that the consistency is an exceptional feat, especially given the economic challenges faced by many organizations in the past year,” said Mayor’s Fund President Megan Sheekey. “It is a privilege to support the innovative public projects of the Bloomberg Administration.”

The Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City serves as the umbrella non-profit organization for the City of New York. Current projects supported by the Mayor’s Fund include MillionTreesNYC, the City’s ambitious campaign to plant and care for one million trees by 2017; Opportunity NYC, the nation’s first conditional cash transfer pilot program for reducing poverty; and the Out-of-School Time initiative, providing quality academic, recreational and cultural activities for New York City youth during non-school hours.

Founded in 2001, Charity Navigator has become the nation’s largest and most-utilized evaluator of charities. Their analysts have examined tens of thousands of non-profit financial documents, and developed an unbiased, objective, numbers-based rating system to assess the financial health of over 5,000 of America’s best-known charities. Charity Navigator’s rating system examines two broad areas of a charity’s financial health—how responsibly it functions day to day as well as how well positioned it is to sustain its programs over time. Each charity is then awarded an overall rating, ranging from zero to four stars. Each charity’s commitment to keeping donors’ personal information confidential is also assessed. Charity Navigator is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization and does not accept funding from the charities it evaluates to ensure that ratings remain objective.