HOW TO VOLUNTEERTo register for free orientation, call 423-472-1595 or go online to hiwasseeredcross.org. The next orientation is at 6 p.m. on Jan. 13.
CLEVELAND, Tenn. — The American Red Cross Hiwassee Chapter is inviting Southeast Tennesseans to bring their volunteer spirit to the aid of others.
“We need more trained volunteers ASAP,” said Michele Hammonds, emergency services program manager for the Red Cross chapter.
The four-county chapter needs more volunteers to help get neighbors back on their feet after sudden disasters, to link military families to their loved ones or to deal with paperwork. And there were more house fires than usual in 2010 in Bradley, Polk, McMinn and Meigs counties, Hammonds said.
Helping others gives something to volunteers, too.
“When you go home, you feel like a really blessed person,” said Cathy Larson, who is finishing up her first year as a Red Cross volunteer.
Even the simplest assignment can blossom into a life-changing moment, she said.
One of her assignments was simply to drop off a kit of cleaning supplies to a man who had a kitchen fire at his home. What she and another volunteer found was a house with no electricity, a child in need of special services and a man with no money and whose only means of communication was walking to a neighbor’s house to use the phone.
The boys’ mother had a drug problem and had left home, Larson said.
“I couldn’t let that one go with just delivering the cleaning kit,” she said.
Larson, other volunteers and a church got involved, and now the boy is getting the medical attention he needs, the house is repaired and has electricity restored and the father is receiving Social Security disability payments.
That kind of service doesn’t take experience, just a little training, said Larson, who makes her living as an interior designer.
For Rob Parnell, retirement didn’t mean resting, it meant finding new ways to stay active.
“I was an 80-hour-a-week kind of guy,” he said.
Spotting a call for Red Cross volunteers in his church bulletin, Parnell answered.
“We all hear about the big international needs and reports that the Red Cross is there,” he said. “For international work, you need an extra level of training. But you don’t often hear what they do locally, when someone near you is in need.”
These days, his volunteer job is shelter agent, providing shelter for people displaced from their homes. In that role, he takes part in area emergency management drills at the local nuclear power plants.
No one goes out with no training or support, Parnell and Larson emphasized. Training takes place throughout the year, some of it online, they said.
Contact Randall Higgins at rhiggins@timesfreepress.com or 423-314-1029.