Days of the week I volunteer
Tuesday, Saturday and/or Sunday.
Responsibilities
- Survey work
- Editing the questions to ensure that they are culturally competent and as least triggering as possible etc…
- Administering of the surveys
- Cooking meals and baking desserts for Sunday
- On Sundays upwards of 40 participants stop at the house where they can relax and enjoy a hot meal. I help to prepare meals on Saturdays that will be usedfor the following day.
- Organizing food donations from Trader Joe’s and distributing them to participants
- Every week we receive anywhere from 10-25+ boxes from Trader Joe’s containing grains, produce, packaged goods and other comestibles. The boxes are then emptied and each box is filled with identical food items to be distributed to families on the block or elsewhere. Some food items are saved to be cooked with for Sunday meals.
- Purchasing clothing items from local thrift store for the “closet”
- The goal is to buy as many clothing items as possible for the least amount of money. In highest demand are long-sleeved shirts and sweaters currently, comfortable shoes, and pants.
- Organizing the “closet”
- The closet is a room on the second floor of the community space which houses all of the clothes, shoes and accessories. Every Sunday participants can come and choose one outfit (ex. one pair of pants + shirt + sweater + shoes).
- The closet is organized by clothing item, size, and occasionally color.
- Create shower-bags
- In each shower-bag (ziploc bag) contains toothpaste, a toothbrush, a bar of soap, mini shampoo and conditioner if available, and underwear.
- Creating shower-bags usually involves an assembly-line process and the bags are organized by under-wear size. Bras are also available upon request.
- Shower-duty
- When on shower-duty I knock on the bathroom door when a participant is showering. 5 minutes is a warning knock and a knock at 10 minutes signals that time is up. When the number of participants is lower than usual, they can have longer showers.
- Door-duty
- This is a rotating position between the volunteers. The volunteer must stand in the door way and record the number of participants that come and what services they will accept (ex. showering, clothes, food etc…)
- The purpose of this is to help when writing grants by providing Project Safe with statistics that can be used.
- Cleaning the house
- This can include vacuuming, washing the dishes etc…