Volunteers build community resilience
Even though National Volunteer Week officially runs from April 14 to 20, events are held throughout April to celebrate the collective power of volunteer efforts and the amazing ripple effect they have to build resilience in a community.
This year’s theme is “Every moment matters.”
So, how much does volunteering matter? Welcome Inn Community Centre is a great example of the impact volunteers make in our community. Welcome Inn is a notfor-profit social service agency in Hamilton’s north end. For over 60 years, it has worked to alleviate poverty, loneliness and marginalization by offering supportive relationships, promoting wellness and providing capacity-building opportunities. It has managed to do this thanks to the help of community members — our precious volunteers.
Welcome Inn is deeply grateful for the many moments volunteers donate to the organization. Quite simply, the staff — a small but mighty group of eight dedicated individuals — could not deliver the programs it offers were it not for the 318 dedicated volunteers who step up annually. They help with everything from after-school programs for children, communal dining for seniors and a food bank to tax clinics, settlement services and peer support groups. In the past year alone, this generous group has logged an impressive 18,547 hours of their time.
Four years ago when the world came to a standstill, Welcome Inn could not safely have volunteers on site. As soon as they could, they returned in droves.
By far the biggest consumer of volunteer hours at Welcome Inn is the food bank — gobbling up a full third of the time donated to the agency. A complement of 68 volunteers puts in over 100 hours each week. This is a huge assist to the two staff members responsible for the food bank as post-pandemic pressure has increased visits by 300 per cent with no sign of letting up.
“Before COVID, we had 11,000 visits in a year. That has risen to 35,711 each year,” explains executive director James VanderBerg, adding, “without volunteers our food bank would not be operational.”
Welcome Inn’s volunteers offer many personal reasons for sharing their time.
Their motives range from decreased stress, building community and being part of a team to having structure in their day, an increased sense of happiness and meeting new people.
Volunteer Patricia says she enjoys contributing to a multicultural community. (All volunteer names here are pseudonyms.)
“After I retired I wanted to give back to my community. I really enjoy meeting people from a variety of backgrounds,” she noted.
For Maya, a newcomer to Canada, volunteering “boosts my spirits because I am around happy, positive people.”
Jeff, who recently moved to Hamilton, says, “I want to do something to give back while I settle in to my new home.”
It may not be possible to give time on a weekly basis but there are other ways to contribute. Points from grocery or drugstore loyalty programs can be used to purchase items for donation. Or you could hold a food drive at your next party or book club gathering, calling ahead to see what the organization currently needs.
Want to volunteer but don’t know where to start? Visit the City of Hamilton website hamilton.ca or contact the United Way of Halton and Hamilton. The latter supports dozens of not-for-profit agencies that would welcome you with open arms.
As Margaret Mead, an American anthropologist, stated so eloquently, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
Later this month, Welcome Inn will join many other organizations in celebrating the contribution of our volunteers. As with similar organizations who rely on volunteers these events are our way of saying, “We salute you, we thank you and we couldn’t do it without you!”