Lyn Brown's secret to running a successful charity isn't much of a secret.

She operates Make-A-Wish Foundation of Hawai'i like a business, watching how each dollar is spent, ensuring everything is done by the book and keeping the organization focused on its mission.

"You have to treat it like it's your own business," said Brown, executive director of the charity that grants wishes to children with life-threatening conditions. "I like to think of us as being a nonprofit run as a for-profit organization."

The success of the $1 million-plus operation, run by a staff of four, has been noted by outside sources.

Charity Navigator, a New Jersey group that evaluates charities, has given the Hawai'i organization its top rating — four stars — the past three years.

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation last year awarded a $200,000 grant to Make-A-Wish — unsolicited.

And by perhaps the best measure of success — how the organization is viewed by the people it is designed to help — it gets top marks.

Kapolei resident Mela Edrada, whose 13-year-old son, Anthony, got to meet Cleveland Cavaliers basketball superstar LeBron James in January before dying of cancer two months later, has nothing but praise for Make-A-Wish.

The charity arranged an all-expenses-paid trip for Anthony and his family to Cleveland, where Anthony met James, sat in a luxury skybox to watch the team play, and went shopping in the Cavaliers souvenir shop with his favorite player. James had given Anthony and six other children from other Make-A-Wish chapters gift cards to spend in the shop.

Once Anthony and his family returned home, he couldn't stop talking about the experience, even as his condition began to worsen. He would happily take friends and relatives to his bedroom to show off the Cavaliers jersey — with Anthony's name on the back — signed by James, the autographed basketballs and the other team paraphernalia he brought back.

"He was just so amazed and happy," Edrada said of her late son. "I could just see it in his eyes."

That expression of joy is what the Make-A-Wish staffers strive to bring to all the children they help.

Each year, the local chapter makes wishes come true for 40 to 50 Hawai'i kids and more than 600 from elsewhere who choose to visit Hawai'i. Next to a Disneyland outing, a Hawai'i trip is the most popular wish of Mainland children.

Brown and her staff are able to help so many kids because of the generosity of others. Individuals and businesses typically donate more than $1 million in money and services each year to the charity because they believe in its mission, and everything the staff does is designed to fulfill that mission and protect the reputation of the charity.

The staff, for instance, has 60 pages of standards from its parent organization that it has to follow, including requirements that anyone who handles money must undergo a credit check each year and that everyone — staff, volunteers and board members — undergo a criminal background check.

The chapter also spends $7,000 to $8,000 each year on a financial audit. "It lends some credibility when you can say to potential donors that you are audited every year and get a clean bill of health," Brown said.

Little things help as well. The organization uses a credit card when it can to accumulate travel points that later can be used for trips, Brown said. It doesn't use telemarketers for fundraising because of the high costs, she added.

"We want to be responsible stewards of donors' money," she said.

Edrada has seen firsthand what kind of steward the charity is, and she shows her approval the best way she can: She donates regularly to Make-A-Wish.

Reach Rob Perez at rperez@honoluluadvertiser.com.