Community Book Festival

Community Book Festival Every day hundreds, if not thousands of families look forward to their local upcoming weekend activities. For some, it is the local fair that rolls into town with the rides for their children. Others, it is a walk on the water front with good food and drinks. For most, it is time to relax, have a cold drink, and enjoy things like Seafair in Washington State, or the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach for Southern California residents. Without local non-profit organizations, most of your favorite weekend activities would not exist. Non-profit organizations support many local events, as well as community programs that would not normally receive assistance. For a non-profit organization to flourish, it must have organization, structure, income, volunteers, a location, and events to move it forward. However, sometime with the fluctuation of the economy, it can make things difficult for the non-profit to move forward or even survive. Local and National Economic Impact For nearly 3 years, the United States has suffered a recession of epic proportions. Charity and non-profit organizations are suffering more than ever as Americans struggle to save every penny possible. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, in December 2007, the United States’ economy fell into recession. However, Dick Conway, a local economist and co-publisher of The Puget Sound Economic Forecaster, reported the Puget Sound region did not enter one until the end of 2008. Conway suggests that, "All of this is related to the collapse of the credit and housing markets" (James, 2009, para. 5). Because of this weak economy, not only nationally, regionally, and in local cities such as Seattle, citizens are much less likely to donate to worthwhile causes such as a non-profit community book drive. Especially with unemployment in Washington state being as high as it is (9.1%, about 323,400 people), and a record amount of deficit in the state budget,

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