Fundraising for charitable organization in the Federal workplace can be traced to the late 1940s. However, formal authority to permit fundraising in the Federal workplace was not established until 1961, when President Kennedy authorized the U.S. Civil Service Commission to develop guidelines and regulate fundraising in the Federal service. Prior to the 1950s, on-the-job fundraising in the federal workplace may best be described as an uncontrolled free-for-all. Federal agencies, employees, and charities were all dissatisfied. Some of the problems cited were:

• no limit to the number of fundraising campaigns in the workplace (10 or 15 per year was not uncommon);
• established monetary quotas freely set by Federal executives for agencies and individuals as supervisors applied pressure to employees;
• an inability to designate to the charity of one's choice; and
• no scrutiny of the organizations soliciting funds in the workplace.

Despite the frequency of on-the-job solicitations, however, total receipts for charitable causes were small.

Seeing a need to consolidate fund-raising efforts, Federal employees created the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) - one campaign, once a year. By allowing employees to select from a single guide (then called the Catalog of Caring) and making their contributions through payroll deduction, the CFC opened wide the door to more opportunities for generous giving to literally thousands of worthy causes.

The CFC is the only authorized charitable fundraising campaign for federal employees, both civilian and military. Conducted by the Federal government under the authority of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the CFC operates in localities throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and on overseas military bases. The CFC continues to be the largest and most successful workplace fundraising model in the world, having raised over $281 million in 2009. Since its inception, the CFC has raised over six billion dollars for thousands of local, national, and international charitable organizations.

All decisions regarding the inclusion of agencies in a local campaign rests with the Local Federal Coordinating Committee (LFCC). The LFCC includes representatives from the federal agencies within the Ohio River Valley's camapign area.

Donations through the CFC can be designated to charitable agencies whose work ranges from aid for the impoverished and medical research to environmental conservation and the arts. The CFC offers federal employees a way to easily and conveniently make a contribution to the good of society as a whole based upon their own beliefs and values.