The Daily Tell

As donations to nonprofit organizations have fallen in recent months, despite the overwhelming response to the earthquake in Haiti, many cultural organizations have reported increasing funding.

Many towns and universities have redirected funds that normally help maintain and update libraries and museums as endowments and available monies have plummeted. The benefits of strong library systems to encourage overall public literacy and academic excellence has resulted in increased support to these institutions.

The Daily Pennsylvanian, the student newspaper at the University of Pennsylvania, reported Thursday that its Rare Book and Manuscript Library received a $4.25 million gift from an anonymous donor. The money will be used to update a floor of the library to make the materials more easily accessible to the university community.

"The Rare Book and Manuscript Library contains some of the most critical material we own. There are incredible riches in terms of manuscripts and books in this library dating from the Middle Ages and beyond," Joseph Zucca, spokesman for Penn libraries, told the news provider.

In Nevada, the threat of public library services being outsourced to a private firm resulted in donations of more than $60,000 in recent months, according to The Union, a newspaper that began "Save Our Libraries," a campaign aimed at raising money for the state’s libraries.

The Oregon Cultural Trust, an organization that aids artistic, historical and cultural nonprofits, announced earlier this month that 2009 donations rose 10 percent over 2008. The average donation to the organization also rose from $479 in 2008 to more than $500 in 2009.

For the most part, though, nonprofit organizations have struggled recently. The Arizona Republic reported Tuesday that 60 percent of the state’s nonprofits reported revenue reductions in 2009.