SFBFS Volunteers

November Volunteer Spotlight: Carrie Detwiler

2009-11-23T23:46:42Z

Carrie, a retired Sacramento area elementary teacher, had always been interested in volunteering at SFBFS since she had several students over the years whose families benefited from Food Assistance and other SFBFS programs. After retiring, Carrie began volunteering in the Mother-Baby program at Oak Park, and her involvement grew over time.

Starting off as a mentor to new families, Carrie would sit down and talk with new moms and dads about raising their babies. It became obvious that Carrie has a unique ability to bond with families and provide them the guidance needed. Her compassion and ability to really listen are the keys to her connections with the families. New parents appreciated Carrie’s kind and caring nature. Eventually, Carrie started making a difference in the lives of hundred of families by leading some of the Family Life workshops in the Mother-Baby program. These parent education workshops teach new parents skills to help them raise their children. Carrie currently leads classes on Child Safety, Developmental Stages of the Newborn, and Story Time, which is a perfect fit for the former teacher. Carrie also recently organized an event for the children of Mother-Baby clients. On September 29, she held a special Story Time celebrating the 40th Anniversary of the popular children’s book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Through events like this, Carrie has shown many families just how fun story time can be.

In addition to her work mentoring the Mother-Baby families, Carrie also sorts donations, hangs clothing, organizes the baby food and diapers, and assists parents in shopping for baby clothing when they come to the Mother-Baby program. During the summer, Carrie noticed a need for donations of diapers, and started a diaper drive in her community. The diapers came at a particularly difficult economic time for many families.

Carrie jumps in wherever she is needed. When the time came for SFBFS to recruit volunteers to speak at outreach events in the community, Carrie was one of the first to volunteer. Her compassion for all the families served in Mother-Baby is evident to all she meets, making her a wonderful ambassador for the organization. Lorena Carranza, Mother-Baby program manager at Oak Park, comments on Carrie’s compassionate nature, saying “All volunteers, staff members and clients who know her always find that Carrie is a wonderful person with a beautiful heart.”

Written by Robin Simpson of Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services

350 families adopted through SFBFS program

2009-12-29T22:55:01Z

I’ve been volunteering at Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services (SFBFS) on a regular basis for the better part of a year now. Generally, I’m there twice a week; more if they’re having an event or need a little extra help. The holidays are always a busy time at SFBFS with their Turkey Drive, Run To Feed The Hungry and Adopt-A-Family all happening in quick succession. Despite the immense amount of planning required for these events and the short time frames, these events are always tremendously well organized by the SFBFS staff, so all that we volunteers have to do is show up.

I was fortunate enough to help out at the Thanksgiving events this year and thoroughly enjoyed them, thus I was looking forward to the Christmas Adopt-A-Family program. The program was being led by the staff at the Saca Community Learning Center (an SFBFS satellite office in North Sacramento). The program sought to help clients who attended the classes offered and received services over the past year. In all, 274 families signed up. If one only looked at the numbers, facilitating gifts between 274 adopted families and those doing the adopting would seem a small task when compared with recent events providing Thanksgiving food boxes to 5,500 families, arranging the distribution of 3,000 frozen turkeys to other community groups, or trying to coordinate parking for 28,000 Run To Feed The Hungry participants. However, as the adopting families began to bring in their holiday purchases, it quickly became evident that this was no trivial undertaking. For ease and organization, as the gifts came in, the gifts were put into large bags, several gifts to a bag; and most families had multiple bags. Doing the math, then, you realize that the number of Christmas presents that we were dealing with easily reached the several-thousands.

I was given the task of organizing the gifts as they came in so they could be catalogued and then easily located when the time for distribution came. We set up a numbering system and organized two huge rooms full of gifts. We sorted out gifts that had lost labels, tracked down presents that had been separated from their mates and rewrapped packages that had lost their wrapping. We tracked the gifts as they came in and monitored them as they went out. Hiccups arose and were sorted out (primarily by Genevieve Deignan, Saca CLC Building Director, who really made this whole thing work), and by the evening on Wednesday December 23rd we had brought in, catalogued, organized and then distributed Christmas presents to over 350 families (because of the tremendous outpouring of gift donations, we were able to make up another 75+ gift bags to give to those who hadn’t signed up as part of the Adopt-A-Family program).

So it was finally over. We’d worked for many weeks, organizing a ton of gifts, to give to a huge amount of deserving people. When working on big events like these, it’s easy to get caught up in the numbers - turkeys donated, runners attending, families adopted. They’re tactile; a way to measure your success. But in the end, though, you realize that it isn’t about the numbers. They’re not the point. They’re not the reason you do this. Helping a man carry gifts to his car and knowing that the kids in the back seat will have something under their Christmas tree is the point. The gratitude in the eyes of an elderly grandmother taking care of her three young grandchildren is the point. Seeing the eyes of another volunteer well up from being able to help someone who has nothing; that is the point. These are the reasons we do this. The people at Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services know this better than anyone.

The above was written by SFBFS volunteer Chris Suter

February Volunteer Spotlight: Chris Suter

2010-01-26T00:30:23Z

From October to December 2009, volunteers contributed over 13,800 hours of service at Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services (SFBFS). One of the top contributors during the busy winter season was volunteer Chris Suter. “He worked basically as an un-paid staff member for two weeks,” says Genevieve Deignan, Director of the Saca Community Learning Center (Saca CLC). She is referring to the last two weeks of December, when the Saca CLC collects donated gifts from the community and matches them to families in need through the annual Adopt-a-Family program. Chris organized the distribution of gifts to over 200 families who participate in programs at SFBFS. Chris volunteered every day for the last two weeks in December, making sure gifts were accounted for and labeled, and devising a system to stay organized. “We could not have completed the Adopt-a-Family gift program successfully without him,” adds Genevieve.

When asked how he came to be an SFBFS volunteer, Chris responds with a laugh. “The economy,” he replies. When Chris lost his job as a fire protection engineer in 2009, he began helping out in the Adult Education program at the Saca CLC, but enjoyed assisting wherever help was needed. In addition to helping students learn English, tutoring in various subjects and even sorting donations for the Mother-Baby program, Chris began to lend his handyman skills around the building. At one point, he noticed some doors at the Saca Center were missing doorstops and took it upon himself to buy and install them on his own. “I enjoy the flexibility of helping out at all different things,” he says.

More than a program volunteer, Chris also supports SFBFS special events and fundraisers. In June 2009, Chris participated in Race for the Rock, a fundraiser benefiting SFBFS where teams of two compete in a scavenger hunt in downtown Sacramento in search of a $25,000 diamond ring. Chris and his teammate thought it would be a fun way to support SFBFS, but also enjoyed placing second in the race. When November came around, Chris volunteered for two other major SFBFS fundraisers, the Broker’s Punt Pass & Kick event and the Run to Feed the Hungry. On November 20, SFBFS held its second annual Turkey Drive, collecting nearly 7,000 frozen turkeys, which were distributed the following week. Chris volunteered for both days of turkey distribution. Once again, Chris worked alongside staff members after most other volunteers headed home, clocking twelve hour days of service each day. He smiles as he recalls building “turkey mountain” in the large walk-in freezer in the Oak Park warehouse to assist with the sorting of turkeys into bins based on weight. “He is a great example of someone that is doing something beneficial with his time while he looks for work,” says Genevieve. “He has fun and is helping the community at the same time.”

Chris, a Sacramento native and recent UC Berkeley graduate, is modest about his contribution. “I have the time, and I enjoy using it this way,” says Chris. “I see the effect that the SFBFS staff has on the people they are helping, and it feels good to contribute to that. I’ve put my volunteer work on my resume, but a one line description just doesn’t do justice to everything that goes on at Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services.”

Written by Robin Simpson of Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services

9th annual SFBFS Volunteer Spirit Awards

2009-12-23T23:46:05Z

On October 30, 2009, staff and volunteers from various programs at Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services (SFBFS) attended the 9th Annual Volunteer Spirit Awards luncheon at Arden Hills Resort. This event, put on by the Volunteer Center of Sacramento and DOVIA, is the largest volunteer recognition ceremony honoring Sacramento area volunteers. Nominees come from a wide range of agencies, with areas of volunteerism ranging from education, animals, heath, family services, hospitals, shelters, counseling and much more. Many SFBFS program managers take advantage of this opportunity to recognize their dedicated volunteers by nominating the dedicated and accomplished volunteers we have at SFBFS.
This year, like years past, SFBFS nominated several outstanding volunteers in various categories. The nominees included Aiyana Pearson (Women’s Wisdom Art program) as Volunteer of the Year Supporting Arts and Recreation, Donald Moore (Adult Education program) as Volunteer of the Year Supporting those Less Fortunate, Minnie Jimenez (Clothing program) for the Heart of Gold award, Colin Keiner (Run to Feed the Hungry fundraising) as Youth Volunteer of the Year, Carrie Detwiler (Mother-Baby program) for the Ray of Light award, Nellie Mackie (Clothing program) for Lifetime Achievement award, and Hank Greenfield (Adult Education program) for the Salt of the Earth award.
All nominees were honored at the luncheon; however, it was Hank and Nellie who took home the awards. Nellie, receiving the award in the Lifetime Achievement category, was recognized for her 19 years of volunteer work in the Clothing program. Nellie has taken it upon herself to make improvements to the Clothing area, purchasing supplies, and taking pride in keeping the shopping area tidy and organized. She is very dedicated, arriving at 7:15am every Monday and Tuesday morning. Nellie has also trained countless other volunteers in the program.
Hank Greenfield, the Salt of the Earth award winner, volunteers at the Saca Community Learning Center in the English as a Second Language classes. Since August of 2006, Hank has contributed over 500 volunteer hours. The Saca Center does not have a full-time ESL teacher and SFBFS relies on volunteers to run the education classes. Hank goes above and beyond by preparing lesson plans at home, providing one-on-one tutoring and even substitute teaching for other classes. Because of Hank’s volunteer commitment, over 50 ESL students are served daily.
SFBFS staff was thrilled to take home two awards and have the opportunity to recognize seven excellent volunteers. “It’s a really nice way to tell volunteers that the time they spend with our organization means a lot to us,” says Volunteer Services Manager Robin Simpson. “Volunteers are vital to all our programs so it’s wonderful to be able to recognize that whenever we get a chance.”

Photos are of Hank Greenfield and Nellie Mackie