Signing up volunteers in the Mempremagog West MRC
The Missisquoi North Volunteer Centre (CABMN) located at 314B Principale in Mansonville recently took its Volunteer Coordination efforts on the road for two Fridays in June. Friday, June 18 CABMN Volunteer Services Coordinator Debra Harding and volunteer services team member, Krysten Vanier spent the morning in the municipality of Bolton-est and the afternoon in Saint-etienne-de Bolton where they set up a table to welcome visitors. The two gave out information about the services of the CABMN and encouraged those who stopped to sign up as volunteers in their area to be available when future volunteer needs present themselves. On Friday, June 25 Harding was joined by recently elected CABMN Board of Directors member, Robert Gagnon at a table set up in the AM in Eastman and in the afternoon in Stukely for the same purpose.
The CABMN serves the MRC Memphremagog West that encompasses the municipalities of Potton, Boltonest, Saint-etienne-de-bolton, Eastman and Stukely-sud. This is a wide area of approximately 530 sq/km serving a population of some 6000 persons. To serve these areas and participate in community events the CAB certainly relies on volunteer involvement and support; in fact, this is vital to bettering the communities it serves.
With 229 registered volunteers the CABMN is able, when an organization, municipality or event is being held in a specific area, to match up the volunteers registered in the area making the pairing easier for the person or group making the request and assuring that there is follow up and support to the volunteers done by the CABMN during and after the event. To date, the service has been working well and the CABMN volunteer coordination team has been happy with the results.
“It is imperative that we inform the population,” said Harding. “Once people understand how the service works, I believe they will be more inclined to register with us knowing that their volunteer time will be spent in their own Municipality.”
Getting this message out has taken some time as many could not grasp why they would sign up with a service located in Potton if they are living in Eastman? The fact is, because the CABMN serves these areas, when needs arise those who need help are calling the CABMN in search of volunteers appreciating that the CAB coordinates this service making it easy for volunteers in the MRC Memphremagog west to be banked in one area through one organization.
“We had hoped that by going to each Municipality to recruit new volunteers would be more fruitful than it was,” explained Harding. “We did not get as many as we had hoped but we did stimulate interest and many took the information home to ponder.”
Spending time in the other municipalities served by the CABMN was a bonus for Krysten Vanier who is part of the Coordination team.
“We may solicit more interest by attending an event in each municipality in the future,” she suggested. “This however was not a waste of time because we got to be seen by the citizens living in the area and hopefully this helped them to realize that our CAB is their CAB too.”
To become a CABMN volunteer contact Debra or Krysten at 450-2923114.