LOCAL VOLUNTEER PROGRAM GOES TO THE STATE CAPITOL
SHARE Iowa participated in Volunteer Iowa/Iowa Mentoring Partnership’s annual Day at the Capitol on March 15, 2016 at the State Capitol Building in Des Moines.
Jen Gillespie, Community Developer, joined representatives from other service programs from across Iowa to meet with legislators to communicate the importance of the volunteer sector. According to the latest report on Volunteering and Civic Life in America, more than 800,000 Iowa volunteers serve an estimated 69.7 million hours annually in formal volunteer positions and over 1,600,000 Iowans volunteer informally each year (such as helping a neighbor).
SHARE Iowa is a grass-roots community development program that has been based in Oskaloosa for over 20 years. The mission of the program is to strengthen communities through volunteer service by providing quality food packages at affordable prices. Through partnership with host sites across Iowa and surrounding states, nearly 40,000 food packages were distributed in 2015. There are no income guidelines to participate – just the requirement to donate two hours of volunteer service back to the local community. In February, 583 volunteers generated 5864 hours of service through participation in SHARE.
For more information about SHARE Iowa, please visit www.shareiowa.org or call 800-344-1107. For more information about Volunteer Iowa, visit www.volunteeriowa.org or call 800-308-5987.
