By, Scott Mittleman

An athlete with the best intentions of starting his or her own charity, may never receive the proper support to help get things off the ground.

Matthew Wade of Athletes Foundations discussed with me the current obstacles facing many athletes. It starts with their agent, who is not initially concerned with their clients work within the community. They want an athlete to be well liked and be a good citizen but not as concerned with them devoting their time and energy to building a non- profit. The need to involve the athlete in the community comes after something happens to possibly tarnish their image in the national media.

Athletes often don’t realize until later in their career that they want to be more involved in giving back. At this point, they aren’t sure about what resources to turn to or who to trust. From the start of their career, people are always hanging around athletes for selfish reasons and trying to reap both financial and social benefits.

Organizations such as Athlete Foundations are there to help steer an athlete through the process of starting a non-profit, organizing fundraising campaigns and just being the face of an organization. For companies to support and sponsor a non-profit run by an athlete, they want to see that athlete have an active role within the organization. They also want to see them investing their own money to help support the non-profit.

When an athlete dedicates themselves to their non-profit, it shows a true desire to support their cause and provides a legitimate base to build the non-profit. They need as much support and resources as possible to aid in this development.

I hope to offer a helping hand to both athletes and non-profits to benefit one another for a good cause. When a group of people work together for something beyond anything materialistic, only good things can happen.

 Thanks for reading and check out my articles each Wednesday.

For some great athlete charities check out:

Warrick Dunn Foundation: http://www.warrickdunnfoundation.org/

Athletes for Hope: http://www.athletesforhope..org/

View my current Non-profit SF Fun Raisers at www.sffunraisers.org