[audio:http://www.wdde.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/greenvolunteer.mp3|titles= Delaware Public Media's Tom Byrne and contributor Eileen Dallabrida discuss the volunteer shortage facing some First State organizations.]
Barbara Hayes is retired from her job as a first-grade teacher but she is still focused on the ABCs of reading.
As a volunteer with Read Aloud Delaware, she reads one-on-one with children in Head Start programs. She brings books to toddlers in waiting rooms at Wilmington Hospital and encourages parents to read to their kids. She helps mothers incarcerated at Baylor Women’s Correctional Institution choose stories to record and send to their children at home.
“I still have a lot to give,” says Hayes, 61, of North Wilmington. “I enjoy filling my time with something worthwhile.”
In recent years, dedicated volunteers like Hayes have been harder to come by for many organizations.
In 2008, Read Aloud had 1,300 volunteers in all three Delaware counties. This year, there are 750 volunteers on its rolls.
In New Castle County, the organizers of Wilmington Garden Day are assessing whether they can sustain the event, which has been a rite of spring for 67 years.
Nationwide, fewer hands are going up when many organizations ask for volunteers.
• In California, the Redlands Horticultural and Improvement Society Spring Flower Show was canceled after 101 years as the ranks of volunteers withered.
• Ambulance service stopped rolling in Oyens, Iowa, because of an anemic response to a call for volunteers willing to commit the time required for emergency medical training.
• In Pennsylvania, the Tamaqua Beautification Association faded away after 25 years.
Mary Hirschbiel, executive director of Read Aloud, believes it’s more difficult for organizations that focus on civic, educational and artistic goals to attract volunteers at a time in which many people are experiencing severe economic hardship.
“We believe that reading is essential to the healthy development of children,” she says. “But many people are thinking about the essentials—food and shelter—and those are the kinds of activities that volunteers are gravitating toward.”
At the Food Bank of Delaware, volunteers logged 25,000 visits in 2013, says Kim Turner, communications director. The hours they donated equal 28.5 full-time employees.
Some volunteers put in only a few hours on a one-time basis. A few are out of work and are volunteering while they look for jobs. Others are in for the long haul.
“We have a couple in their 80s who have volunteered every Tuesday for five years,” she says.
For several months, Todd Zickle of Wilmington volunteered at the Sunday Breakfast Mission in the city, serving food to homeless people while he was looking for a job as a business forecaster.
Then a career counselor suggested he volunteer at the Food Bank. In addition to the satisfaction of helping others, he would receive a food card valued at $189 in exchange for 25 hours a month of service.
“It’s an added benefit to volunteering,” he says.
Zickle volunteers at the Food Bank’s center in Newark, packaging meals in the kitchen. He especially enjoys work that connects him with people, such as help patrons unload carts of food into their cars.
“On a rainy day an older woman look my arm, like my grandmother, and I held an umbrella over her as we walked to her car,” he recalls.
Zickle also appreciates that volunteers are managed efficiently. They can sign up for shifts online; managers assign tasks as soon as volunteers arrive.
“There’s no standing around waiting for something to do,” he says.
With so much competition for willing hands, making sure volunteers’ time is not wasted is a key component in keeping people coming back, says Cher Frampton, volunteer coordinator at Lutheran Community Services in Wilmington.
“It’s important that they are busy, that they feel needed and wanted,” she says.
There currently are more than 400 volunteers at LCS, says spokesman Steve Tindall. Most volunteers work between five and 30 hours a month.
Many come from the congregations of 30 churches, including 12 Lutheran congregations, who are committed to the organization. Others are participating in the state food card program. Some devote time as part of a job training program.
“They are trying to build their work skills through volunteering,” Frampton says.
For some individuals, volunteering is mandatory. They are ordered by the court to perform community service as part of a sentence or plea bargain.
LCS operates food distribution centers for low-income people at 14 different locations. Frampton interviews volunteers to determine their skill sets and personal interests.
“I try to get to know the person and what a good match would be,” she says. “A lot of people enjoy hands-on activity and distributing food is very direct, handing food to someone and getting that gratification when they say ‘thank you.’”
On a recent day, more than 20 volunteers from Bank of America cleaned up the grounds of LCS’s new building at 2809 Baynard Blvd. in Wilmington. Other volunteers work with people who need help getting their prescriptions filled.
“We have a core of volunteers that stays with us constantly, plus a healthy turnover of people who are coming through who keep the organization fresh,” Frampton says. “Some are still working and others are retired and treat it like a job.”
LCS also operates a home repair program, but most of that work is handled by the staff.
“There are money decisions, case work decisions, dealing with people’s personal financial information, so it isn’t well suited to volunteers,” Tindall says.
Roseanne Miller, who chaired Wilmington Garden Day, is an active volunteer, devoting time to such activities as cooking dinner for the residents of Epiphany House in Wilmington, a transitional shelter for women who are recovering from substance abuse or domestic violence.
She says several factors contributed to the decline in volunteers for Garden Day. In a protracted sour economy many people are working longer hours, resulting in little time for volunteering.
“Many people I talk to prefer to focus on only one group,” she says.
The Cathedral Church of Saint John, the lead of four Episcopal parishes supporting the tour, closed in 2012. She also believes that many people perceive the event solely as a garden tour and aren’t aware of its main purpose, which is to raise money for Friendship House, which offers programs for homeless people, and St. Michael’s School, which serves children from infancy through second grade.
“People are looking for a personal connection when they volunteer,” Miller says. “If we do go forward with Garden Day we need to be clear and specific as to how it benefits children, such as providing scholarships for St. Michael’s.”
Hayes learned about Read Aloud Delaware through a newspaper article. After 35 years in education, she was attracted to an opportunity to read to children.
“After I retired, I knew I would miss my interaction with children,” she says. “After I got started with Reading Aloud, I discovered there were more ways I could volunteer through the organization.”
Hayes works with mothers at Baylor, who select books to read aloud and record for their children.
“Sometimes, there are tears because they are so sad that they aren’t sitting next to their child when they are reading,” she says.
Often, volunteers are frustrated because communication at the prison is poor.
“You waste a lot of time waiting,” Hayes says. “And then the last woman you see thanks you for coming out and it’s all worthwhile.”
When she was volunteering at Wilmington Hospital, Hayes found another opportunity to serve. She is now working with kids at First State School, a school for chronically ill children sited inside the hospital.
“There are people out there who are willing to volunteer,” she says. “It’s just a matter of them finding us—or us finding them.”