5 Swampscott Area Nonprofits To Support This Holiday Season

SWAMPSCOTT, MA — If you're like many of your Swampscott neighbors, you may spend a good part of the holiday season with your credit card in hand buying gifts for family and friends. Coming up soon is a chance to give back to the local community.

Giving Tuesday, which in 2024 falls on Dec. 3, is a day dedicated to supporting nonprofit and community groups. Since 2012, nonprofits worldwide have used the Tuesday after Thanksgiving to galvanize fundraising, rally volunteers and add momentum to their causes.

Maintaining funding is a constant challenge for many nonprofits that fill gaps and meet other needs on the North Shore.

Here are five local nonprofits to consider getting behind on Giving Tuesday:

1. Beverly Bootstraps: Beverly Bootstraps provides critical resources to families and individuals so they may achieve self-sufficiency. It offers emergency and long-term assistance including access to food, housing stability, adult and youth programs, education, counseling and advocacy. It is community-funded and supported.

2. Operation Troop Support: The Danvers-based Operation Troop Support focuses its efforts on helping our deployed troops as well as their loved ones back home. Established in March 2003, OTS serves deployed men and women in uniform from across the country with care packages and family support for those serving overseas.

3. Citizens Inn: The Peabody-based organization aims to break the patterns of instability that lead to homelessness and hunger for every family and individual served. Its programs — Citizens Inn Between, Citizens Inn Transition, Citizens Inn Homes, and Citizens Inn Haven from Hunger — are designed to help families and individuals prepare for and transition to a sustainable life.

4. The Salem Pantry: The Salem Pantry provides the North Shore with convenient access to fresh, free, healthy food. Its innovative public pop-up pantries, home deliveries, and The Market offer an abundant selection of produce, proteins, spices, and dairy products. The Pantry partners with local farmers and health organizations to nourish our community from the inside out.

5. SPUR North Shore: SPUR makes volunteering at any age easy by providing accessible opportunities that meet the tangible needs of the community. SPUR offers a variety of thoughtful and flexible engagement opportunities that result in rewarding volunteer experiences and measurable community impact. Through a dynamic service-learning initiative, SPUR equips the youngest members of area communities with tools to identify problems, cultivate an innate response to community needs, and develop as future change-makers.