charity

City Union Mission, a Christian charity, says it distributed nearly 20,000 gifts to struggling Kansas Citians this Christmas, more than ever before.

The Rev. Dan Doty says during 40 years of its Christmas program, City Union Mission has never received more requests for help or given out more gifts. One-thousand twenty-one families, or a total of about 5,000 people, received presents, up 20 percent over 2015.

A far-reaching software piracy scheme has led to the indictment in Kansas City of former NBA player Kermit Washington, who is accused of using a charity he founded to defraud donors, eBay, PayPal and the IRS.

The indictment was unsealed this morning. Washington was arrested Tuesday in Los Angeles and is set to make a court appearance before U.S. Magistrate Judge John T. Maughmer on June 16.

A three-member team from Lenexa-based medical nonprofit Heart to Heart International arrived in Ecuador Sunday night, less than 24 hours after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of the Central American nation.

As of Monday morning, international news organizations were reporting at least 272 people had died and more than 2,500 had been injured. 

Kansas is ranked in the top ten most charitable states in the country, according to a study released by the personal finance website WalletHub.

Kansas tied narrowly with Idaho to rank third in the nation. Utah came in first place and South Dakota came in second.

According to the publishers, the purpose of the study was to foster holiday competition between the states to increase their charitable activities.

WalletHub ranked the states using eight criteria:

Kansas is the sixth most charitable state, according to a poll out this month from the research company Gallup.

Sixty-two percent of Kansans reported donating money in the past month, while 45 percent donated time and 39 percent donated some of both.

Missouri came in at 34th with 64 percent of residents donating money, 41 percent donating time and 31 percent engaging in both.