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Residents find satisfaction through volunteerism

Sure, volunteer to help others.
web-volunteer1
Canadian Red Cross provincial manager Rhonda Schwab

Sure, volunteer to help others. Sure, volunteer to benefit yourself.

But volunteer to find a significant other?

“Don’t go to a bar. Don’t go to eHarmony. Go volunteering! You never know who you’ll meet,” exclaimed Sandy Jacobs, who found her husband while giving her time to volunteerism.

But though that life partner was long ago found for Sandy in Garry Jacobs, she, and her husband, continue today to give hours of their lives to the Canadian Red Cross through volunteering.

Sandy serves as a disaster management coordinator with the international organization, springing into action to help those beset by fires, floods and freak disasters.

She has volunteered, serving as a friendly face and vital information dispenser, in the aftermath of the Pine Lake tornado, Red Deer’s 2001 anhydrous ammonia spill, and, more recently, the Slave Lake fire.

“It makes me just feel happy that I can help someone when they’re in need. It’s just a very good feeling to know that you were able to help, even if it is, in the overall scheme of things, a very little piece,” explained Jacobs.

Sandy is one of the 66 volunteers ranging in age from six to 80 with the Red Deer Red Cross, a group that collectively served over 18,000 volunteer hours last year.

April 21-27 marked National Volunteer Week in Canada.

Volunteer opportunities in Red Deer range from teaching English to new immigrants to playing crib with Michener Centre residents.

Just over half of Albertans volunteer, according to 2010 statistics, with the average volunteer serving 172 hours per year.

Red Deer is noted for its ability to host major events, said Mayor Morris Flewwelling, events which are hugely dependent on volunteers.

Hundreds of hours were recently devoted to the Allan Cup, the Special Olympics Spring Games, and the Kiwanis Music Festival, while the upcoming Tour of Alberta local stop will require 300 volunteers, and annual events like the Festival of Trees are dependent on thousands.

Flewwelling himself has received a number of awards for his decades of volunteer service, most notably the Order of Canada in 1997.

He said the community as a whole is very generous with time, money and talent.

And it has been for many years — Red Deer had the highest voluntary enlistment per capita in Canada for both the First World War and Second World War.

“We’re never going to not need volunteers, and I think it would be a sad day if we ever did reach that point where we had the luxury of so much money and resources that we didn’t need anybody to volunteer.

“That would be, in my view, a real curse because it would really disenfranchise a lot of people who would want to be engaged in something,” said Flewwelling.

During National Volunteer Week, Volunteer Red Deer held events and showcased different volunteer-based organizations with presentations in Parkland Mall.

The organization helps connect volunteers to the hundreds of organizations seeking volunteers in the city.

Program manager Danielle Black Fortin said Red Deerians are passionate about the volunteer work they do.

“They usually stay with a volunteer opportunity because of a connection they’ve made, whether it’s at the organization or with a client they work with. Those connections and those stories of what happens is the most powerful thing — the ability to help somebody, whether it’s big or small,” she said.

A listing of volunteer opportunities in Red Deer can be found at www.volunteerreddeer.ca.

mfish@www.reddeeradvocate.com