|
American Red Cross, Santa Barbara County Chapter Volunteers of the Month
Archives
2007 Volunteers of the Month
North County: Alesia Yglesias
 Alesia has been an active Disaster Action Team Member and helped 15 families cope with devastating house fires this year. She also worked in shelters during the Zaca Fire and was willing to take on new leadership roles like Shelter Manager. Alesia is an excellent office manager and her volunteering allows staff to attend important off-site functions. She represents our Chapter at community events and other programs like the Santa Maria Airport Drill. Alesia is a terrific volunteer and we appreciate everything she does for our Chapter and community!
South County: Suzanne Zondler
 Suzanne is the Chair of Emergency Services Volunteers and has worked diligently to improve her Department and its services. In recent months, she contacted all the Disaster Volunteers and developed a Red Cross training career path for each. Suzanne is constantly updating volunteer information and in an emergency this information will help orchestrate an efficient and effective response. She worked tirelessly during the Zaca Fire with Staff Services to support and recruit Disaster Volunteers. Suzanne is in the office on a regular basis three to four days a week and her commitment is amazing. Without volunteers like Suzanne, we could not provide critical services to our community.
North County: Dr. Guillermo Gutierrez
 Dr. Guillermo Gutierrez has been a volunteer with us for about two years. He was born and lived in Columbia, South America most of his life. Guillermo is a Hispanic Outreach Taskforce member and has been instrumental in translating documents into Spanish. Guillermo has also represented us at several Hispanic community events to further our work in Spanish speaking communities. He has built carts to go into our Disaster Emergency Services trailers, translated “A Night in the Shelter” coloring books, and even cleaned out our refrigerator! Guillermo’s children have also been Volunteers of the Month and the whole family turned out to help raise funds for the victims of the recent wildfires at our “Drive Through” event in Santa Maria. We are blessed with the best volunteers in the world!
 South County: Shirley Edwards
Shirley Edwards has for many years helped calculate and process the public support donations which can be a tedious and frustrating task at times! Shirley ensures that all the donations from individuals and organizations are calculated correctly and donor intent is properly honored. Shirley is a hoot to work with and is knowledgeable and dedicated. She has a fantastic sense of humor and is just plain fun to work with! Shirley’s cheeriness and smile always brightens our days and we are very lucky to have such an amazing lady as a volunteer!
North County: Greg Koby
Greg Koby has been a volunteer with our District office in Santa
Maria for about three years. He puts in a great deal of his volunteer
hours as the pinch hitter “office jack of all trades.” Greg answers
phones, assists with mailings and filing, or just holds down the office
so that our staff can attend the monthly all-staff meetings in Santa
Barbara. He has helped us move our offices a couple of times as well.
Greg is a valued volunteer and a part of our Red Cross family. He has a
passion for computer games which explains why he is so good with
computers. Greg's background is in radio, television and film. He will
be leaving us in the near future to move to Los Angeles to pursue a film
career. Greg says that while in L.A. he still wishes to be a volunteer
for the Red Cross. We all thank you, Greg, for your dedication as a
volunteer for our Red Cross Chapter.
South County: Donna Higbee
Donna Higbee has been an excellent volunteer this month, stepping up
when most of the Emergency Service Department was deployed to San Diego.
She came in every day to assist where needed, even tackling the dreaded
job of organizing the Disaster Videos. Donna helped with the KEYT
"drive-thru" raising funds for the Red Cross Relief Effort for the
California Wildfires, volunteered for the Airport Drill -- doing a
superb acting job as one of the grieving family members. She's also
helped organize the entire office, and her cheery face has made coming
to work a pleasure.
North County: Laurie Evans
Laurie is a CPR/First Aid Instructor for our North County region. She has
been with the Red Cross since 2004 and volunteers in our office as a
receptionist, jack of all trades -- doing anything and everything that we
need help getting done. She is full of energy and a barrel of laughs!! You
can tell when Laurie is teaching class by the uproar of laughter coming out
of the classroom. She gets all the points across with a dose of humor that
makes students call in after class and say that they have never learned so
much in such a fun way. We have had company Human Resources people call in
and say that they only want Laurie to teach their employees because they
talk for days about what fun they had taking the class at the Red Cross.
Laurie also has a business that keeps her busy when she’s not helping the
Red Cross. She and her husband own Polar Products, which makes personal
cooling products that are used to keep athletes, regular folks, and our
military personnel overseas cool in "too hot to handle" situations. Laurie
and her husband have sold their products at Relay for Life to walkers for
the past few years and donated the profits to the American Cancer
Association. She is a true community contributor in the best way.
South County: Ken Warkentin
Ken does a lot of behind the scenes work and if Disaster Services needs
someone in a pinch, Ken is always there! He has been instrumental in getting
our garages organized and inventoried. This allows us to quickly and
efficiently supply clients with immediate disaster needs. Ken is also an
incredible handyman. He has assembled shelving in the garage, made media
shelves and is always willing to check out a disaster vehicle when it’s
having issues. Ken often goes on National Red Cross Disaster assignments and
the evaluations of his work are always glowing! Often supervisors request
Ken to work in their specialty because of his talent and track record. Ken
has taken on some of the nastiest and dirtiest jobs and always does them
with a smile! I am not sure what we would do without Ken always ready to
help.
North County: Alejandro Gutierrez & Diana Gutierrez
We have had a dynamic duo working in our North County offices all
summer. This is a team of brother and sister who took their summer
vacation from school to donate several hours each and every day of the
week to our Chapter. They helped answer phones, sign up clients for
Health and Safety classes, file, perform computer input duties, set up
class rooms, pack us up to move, and in their spare time they were
involved in translating our Volunteer Job Descriptions manual into
Spanish as a part of our “Hispanic Outreach Taskforce” efforts. Wash a
vehicle? No problem. Sweep out the warehouse? No problem. Vacuum and
clean out our class room? No problem. They put in 200 hours of Volunteer
service in July and August alone. Alejandro Gutierrez & Diana Gutierrez
make up a force to be reckoned with. They were born in Columbia and have
been here for about three years. Their father, Guillermo Gutierrez,
works along side his family donating his time to our Chapter on Tuesdays
& Thursdays translating our Volunteer Job Descriptions manual as a
member of our “Hispanic Outreach Taskforce”. He has put in 40 hours of
volunteer service on the project alone.
South County: Jim Cortwright
Jim has helped the Safety & Preparedness department with the record
keeping of all course records from all Santa Barbara County. He has also
worked on our Instructor files, keeping them up to date. Jim comes to
our Santa Barbara office and is always ready to help with any other
project that he can assist with. Thanks to Jim we have been able to
track hard copy course record sheets when our database is not
accessible. Jim’s work is an intricate component of the Safety &
Preparedness department and providing quality programs to the community.
North County: Amy Lyon
Amy started with our Red Cross Chapter in March of this year. It was
apparent from our first meeting that Amy was organized, hard working,
and conscientious. She had the skills to work as our Safety &
Preparedness Office Assistant with little or no additional training. She
assists our North County Safety & Preparedness Department in maintaining
class records, contacting instructors, answering questions about courses
over the phone, entering data and preparing classrooms. She exhibits a
true interest in people and works well with volunteers and paid staff.
Amy is a student at Allan Hancock College and divides her free time
between Red Cross volunteer hours, riding her horses, and practicing
martial arts. We are very fortunate to work along side such a giving and
focused young person.
South County: Mikaela McKenna
Mikaela has learned to field the many questions and situations that
the front desk encounters and always has a smile for every costumer. She
has been very helpful in giving great customer service when participants
are signing up for CPR and First Aid courses and has really stepped up
to man the receptionist desk when we have needed last minute coverage.
Mikeala is very helpful to Spanish speaking customers even if she is not
fluent; she does anything possible to make them feel comfortable.
Mikeala is an awesome volunteer and we appreciate all her hard work!
North County: Joan Finn
Joan has been an active part of our North County weekly staff. She
Volunteers with us two or three days a week, after working a full day as
a volunteer at our Santa Maria food bank. Joan was instrumental in
compiling the statistics for our Annual IPC2 Chapter Volunteer Survey
that measures volunteer satisfaction during the year. It was a huge
undertaking that relied on Joan’s meticulous methodology and close
attention to detail. Aside from that project, Joan is always willing to
handle any task that would drive the average volunteer out of their
minds. She has always been there for us, and her bright smile and happy
personality is always a pleasure to work around. Joan has been helping
us update our Volunteer files as of late and took a little vacation to
her home town of New York City. Thanks for all of your help Joan and
hurry back!
South County: Marianell Schaff, Sandy Sacks & Emily Smith
Marianell is a Disaster Services Volunteer and is a critical
component of our Chapter. She organizes contacts and delegates
volunteers to National Emergencies and without her organization and
preparedness, people in emergency situations all over the country would
not get the care they need. Even though Marianell’s task is stressful
and intricate, she always has a positive attitude and smile!
Sandy is an excellent Red Cross Volunteer and has one of the most
important jobs at the Chapter! He patiently calls all of our donors and
personally thanks them for their contributions. Although he may call
hundreds of donors, Sandy treats each phone call like the first and his
sincerity is amazing. He never looks for recognition for this hard work
and we are honored that he would share his valuable time with us!
North County: Chuck Dion
Chuck is our do everything guy. If he’s not gathering supplies,
repairing cots, or packaging blankets for our Emergency Reponse
Trailers, he’s busy keeping the North County vehicles in repair and
maintained to their tip top condition. In Chuck’s spare time he
volunteers to participate in Airport Emergency Drills, or any other kind
of event that Red Cross is involved in.
South County: Brandon Jenkins
Brandon Jenkins, a senior from UCSB, was an intern in the finance
department. Brandon assisted in all the accounting areas including Bank
Reconciliation, Payroll, accounts reconciliation, financial reports
preparation, and analysis of financial reports. Brandon was an excellent
assistant in the process of cleaning up the finance department and we
appreciate all his hard work!
North County: Kendra Hubbard
Kendra is one of our Red Cross Youth Volunteers. Kendra is a star
when it comes to computer input, filing, making out safety cards for
students that have completed courses with us, record keeping, and any
number of other tasks that we ask her help with. Kendra helps train new
volunteers, when they come to us, for the job tasks that she has
mastered. Kendra also rode in the ERV, accompanied by her Dad, in our
Lompoc Christmas Parade this past year.
South County: Shirley Edwards, Claude Gago, & The Carty Family
Shirley is one of our awesome Public Support Volunteers. She is always
smiling and has a friendly word for everyone in the office. She helps
keep track of the enormous amount of paperwork and record keeping
involved with fundraising. Without her diligent, committed and detail
orientated work, we would not be able to adequately thank Red Cross
donors. Shirley is a lovely person and volunteer and we are very happy
she spends time with us!
Claude is a Disaster Services Volunteer and is the Superman of
handiwork. Claude has organized garages, fixed Chapter vehicles, hung
marquee boards and keeps everyone laughing in the process. Claude always
has a great story or word of encouragement and his hugs can make
anyone’s day better! He has also made volunteering a family affair and
introduced his grandson to the Red Cross. We would not be able to
deliver critical supplies and services to the community without Claude’s
help!
Debbie, Linden, Jack & Taylor Carty comprise the Carty Party. They
have had volunteer jobs in every single department and are always
willing to take on whatever task. They have sharpened hundreds of
pencils, clean the kitchen, represented the Red Cross at community
events, given disaster preparedness presentations to elementary
students, put together training manuals and materials, written Red Cross
articles for community papers and spread energy throughout the office!
We are so glad this family decided to spend their time with us!
|
