Corporate Relations & Engagement

Yum Brands, which owns KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut, is introducing its sixth annual World Hunger Relief fundraiser, to benefit the United Nations World Food Programme and other groups.

Christina Aguilera will be a spokeswoman, and the effort, which encompasses all three brands, will be promoted in their nearly 38,000 restaurants in more than 120 countries. Rather than donations being tied to buying certain menu items, consumers will be asked when they are at the register whether they would like to contribute, as has been the case since the program began in 2007.

Toyota announced the second group of winners of the Toyota 100 Cars for Good program, a national philanthropic program that is awarding 100 cars to 100 nonprofits over the course of 100 consecutive days. Winners are selected each day through public voting on Facebook at www.100carsforgood.com.

Retailer J.C. Penney has launched jcp cares, a new charitable giving program. Through jcp cares, J.C. Penney will support a new cause each month by inviting customers to round up their purchases to the nearest whole dollar and donate the difference to the company's featured charity partner. It kiccked off July 1 with jcpenney's support of the USO. Along with round-up donations raised by customers throughout the month of July, jcpenney will be making a $1 million donation to the USO.

Corporate philanthropic donations as a share of pretax profit are trending at their lowest levels since the 1970s, according to a report presented Wednesday in Philadelphia.

"Corporations are clearly not stepping up," said Patrick Rooney, executive director of the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University, speaking to dozens of fundraisers from the region at the Union League.

It wasn't quite so clear to Wynnewood lawyer Laura N. Solomon, whose firm specializes in nonprofits.

Wells Fargo & Co. announced a $15 million relationship with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) that launches its new environmental grant program aimed at awarding $100 million to nonprofit organizations and universities by 2020. The five-year program with NFWF will combine the nonprofits’ scientific expertise with Wells Fargo’s philanthropic and volunteer resources to promote environmental stewardship in communities across the U.S.

Details about the new environmental grant program are available here: https://www.wellsfargo.com/about/csr/ea/environmental-giving.

Morgan Stanley announced that 15 nonprofit organizations will participate in the fourth annual Strategy Challenge, a skills-based volunteering program providing nonprofits with pro bono strategic consulting.

Each nonprofit will work with a team of Morgan Stanley employees for eight weeks.  The teams will advise the nonprofits on issues relating to their business models and growth strategies, in order to help the nonprofits fulfill their missions in more effective and efficient ways. The employees will use their professional skills and expertise to develop recommendations for the nonprofits.

NCB, consisting of National Consumer Cooperative Bank, NCB, FSB and NCB Capital Impact, reported that $490 million was committed and deployed to low and moderate income communities during 2011. The capital infusion provided to these communities through direct lending, investments, the facilitation of creative transactions and new national initiatives in the following impact sectors: housing, health care, education, community and economic development, business cooperatives, small business, expansion and development, investments and grants, and renewable energy.

A Billion + Change, a national campaign to mobilize billions of dollars of pro bono and skills-based volunteer services, announced that 78 companies have pledged a total of $1.6 billion in skills-based volunteer service to nonprofit organizations across the nation.

Pledge companies' skills-based volunteer programs tackle everything from education, youth services and health care to economic growth, workforce development and programs addressing military families and veterans.

Harvard Business School just released its first study of U.S. competitiveness, reporting that almost two-thirds of U.S. businesses will locate their new plants outside the U.S. None of this is surprising. But for me, one finding was truly shocking: only 22 percent of U.S. managers believe that doing good for their communities will help their businesses.

Has the economic pressure really had that extreme an impact? I remember just a few years ago that managers believed that doing good for their communities was critical to their business and their reputations.

Cars.com, the online resource for buying and selling new and used vehicles, announced the launch of its "Cars Cares" campaign during Super Bowl XLVI. During the game, when the Cars.com commercial airs, viewers who use the Shazam App to tag the ad will earn $1 for one of seven charities in contention for a maximum $100,000 donation from the site.

The maximum $100,000 donation will be given to the charity that receives the most votes on the Cars.com Facebook page between Jan. 26 and Feb. 13.