How to help Minneapolis, Joplin (and other) tornado victims

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How to help Minneapolis, Joplin (and other) tornado victims

Monday, May 23, 2011

Storm season is always awful, but Mother Nature has been particularly nasty this year.

Sixty-eight tornadoes were confirmed over the weekend. Two cities were particularly hard hit.

Now the residents of Minneapolis, Minn., and Joplin, Mo., are trying to salvage something, anything as storms continue to rumble in their areas.

If you can spare some cash, there are several ways you can help.

The Community Foundation of Kansas City has created two funds to pool donations. You can make donations online via the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation's Joplin, Mo., Disaster Relief Fund and the Reading, Kan., Relief Fund.

Convoy of Hope is accepting online donations at its website or you can make a $10 text donation by texting the word CONVOY to 50555.

The Salvation Army also will take your online contributions, as well as $10 text donations sent by texting the word JOPLIN to 80888. The group also has set up emergency relief teams in Reading, Kan., and Minneapolis.

The American Red Cross is taking donations for tornado vicitms across the United States at its website or $10 donations from folks who text the word REDCROSS to 90999.

The Red Cross also operates an online Safe and Well page where residents can register to let family and friends know that they are OK, relatively speaking.

I hate to have to say this, but we've still got lots of storm season left. And the Atlantic hurricane season begins in just over a month.

You might want to bookmark these websites and enter the text donation numbers into your phones.

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Posted on Monday, May 23, 2011 at 04:16 PM in Charity, Disaster | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tags: charity, contribution, Convoy of Hope, disaster, donation, Joplin, Kansas, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Missouri, Red Cross, Salvation Army, tornado

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Weekly Tax Tip

Form 1040X gives you a filing do-over — Made a mistake on your 1040? Found a tax break you overlooked? Then Uncle Sam's X file, aka Form 1040X that lets you amend prior filings, can help you get the truth about your taxes to the Internal Revenue Service. (May 17, 2019)
Check out all the latest post-Tax Day tax advice in the 2019 edition of Weekly Tax Tips. Many of these once-a-week tips will focus on planning moves to cut your 2020 tax bill. If, however, you're working on a filing extension for your 2018 return, you can get a refresher of the 2019 Filing Season Tax Tips at their respective monthly pages: January, February, March and April.

All About Kay

OK, some about Kay

Kay Bell — Native Texan (the blog title totally makes sense now, right?). Professional journalist. Tax geek.

My Other Accounts

Tick ... Tick ... Tick

Tax Season 2019 continues!
Are you among the almost 15 million taxpayers the IRS estimates are now on extension to file their 2018 tax returns? That new Oct. 15 tax filing deadline will be here before you know it. The countdown clock below will help you track the days until that absolutely final filing due date arrives. Maybe in the next six months, we'll have a better handle on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act changes!
Note: I'm in the Central Time Zone, so adjust accordingly for where you live.

Time for Tax Tasks

May 1: Happy May Day!

via GIPHY

This isn't a big holiday in the United States, but globally the first day of May is a time for celebrating workers' contributions. But it is the perfect day to take care of employment-related tax tasks, such as doing a paycheck check-up to see if you need to adjust your payroll withholding.

It's always a good idea when you get a big refund or owe a lot. But such a review is especially important this year for folks surprised by the size (or lack thereof) of their tax refunds in this first filing season where the full effects of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act came into play.

May 5: ¡Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

!

Before you raise a margarita to this Mexican holiday that tends to be a bigger celebration here than south of the border, consider making one or more of these five tax-smart tax moves:

1) File your 2018 tax return ASAP if you missed the April filing deadline. Remember, Free File is still open for qualifying taxpayers.
2) Get professional help with that late filing or extension by hiring a tax pro.
3) Contribute as much as you can to your retirements plan(s), be they an IRA (Roth or traditional version) and/or a workplace account.
4) Rebalance your portfolio. Long-term appreciated assets are taxed at lower capital gains tax rates.
5) Tune up or establish your tax record keeping system for your 2018 tax documents and in preparation for the 2019 tax year.

May 10: Does your job include tips? Did you receive $20 worth of gratuities in April? Then use Form 4070 to report them today to your employer.

May 12: Happy Mother's Day!

Make it a special one for the moms in your life, from those just now discovering the joys, tax and otherwise, of parenthood to the gracefully aging mom that you're helping maneuver through her golden years.

May 17: Before spring slips into summer, take care of your spring tax cleaning. Give away clothing and household goods you no longer use. Your philanthropy could provide you a charitable tax deduction if you itemize your 2018 taxes.

May 24: Kick spring cleaning up a notch. Go beyond housekeeping and house clearing and make those home repairs you've been putting off. Many home improvements, including landscaping, could pay off in by increasing your home's basis, which means your profit for tax purposes will be smaller and stay under the amount that's tax-free when you eventually sell your home.

May 24: If you're heading out early for the long Memorial Day weekend that traditionally kicks off summer, be aware of the many travel related taxes, such as excise taxes on airfare and an increasing number of local taxes added to short-term home rentals.

May 25: What's that? Instead of taking a Memorial Day trip, you're staying home to work on your 2018 tax return that's on extension. If you qualify, the IRS-tax software industry partnership known as Free File is waiting for you. As noted earlier, this IRS/tax software industry partnership, now in its 17th year of providing eligible taxpayers the opportunity to prepare and e-file their taxes, as the name says, at no cost, is still open for procrastinating filers.

This year, qualifying taxpayers — that's those with income of $66,000 or less — can use one of the expected dozen or so special commercial tax software programs at IRS.gov's Free File online page. Even if you make too much to use the online software, you can file using Free File's fillable forms.

May 31: You filed weeks ago, but were hoping to have your refund to spend on your holiday trip. It hasn't shown up yet. Find out what's happened to it by using the IRS' "Where's My Refund?" online tracking tool.

Small Business Tax Calendar: Important filing, deposit and record keeping dates throughout the year that your company needs to know. You also can view the full year's important business tax dates in IRS Pub. 509.

State Tax Help

Don't forget your state taxes!
Forty-three states and D.C. collect personal income taxes. But even if you live in of the seven states without an income levy, you still face other state (and local) taxes.

State Tax Departments provides links to your state's Web page. The companion page, Tax Tidbits, is the compilation of blurbs about each state's tax laws. And for more state tax news, check out all our state tax bloggings.

0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 ...

Taxes are all about the numbers.
Check out these (mostly) weekly
By the Numbers figures.

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I gotta tell ya ...

AKA Disclaimer:
I am a professional journalist who has been covering tax issues since 1999.
I am not a professional tax preparer.
The content on Don't Mess With Taxes is my personal opinion based on my study and understanding of tax laws, policies and regulations. It is provided for your private, noncommercial, educational and informational purposes only. It is not a recommendation of any specific tax action(s) you should or should not take. Similarly, mentions of products or services are not endorsements. In other words, my ramblings on the ol' blog are free advice and you know what they say about getting what you pay for. That's why when it comes to filing your taxes, I urge you to get additional, professional, paid-for guidance from an accountant, Enrolled Agent or other qualified tax preparer who is familiar with your individual tax circumstances.

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