A volunteer is a person who performs a service willingly or without pay. Every day volunteers are helping Samaritan House in our mission to improve our community and the surrounding areas. We recruit volunteers for every department at Samaritan House.
How volunteers are managed is important to us, so we strive to make our volunteer’s hours used to the best of their abilities. Volunteers have the option of spending their time with a few different sections of Samaritan House. These include the thrift store, food pantry, shelter, office, and other opportunities as they arise.
A thrift store volunteer has an opportunity to experience a retail setting. Daily, many donations are brought to the store where employees and volunteers are going through the donations cleaning, organizing, and pricing those donations to be taken out to the sales floor. There is also need for volunteers to help clean and maintain the look of the store. Having a clean environment is essential for people to feel comfortable shopping and for them to feel welcome. Volunteers are needed daily for this to happen.
The Food Pantry is a significant way to assure hungry people in our community get the food that they need and will use. Samaritan House’s Food Pantry is a People’s Choice Pantry. In a nutshell, people who come to our pantry get to choose from proteins, vegetables, fruit, grains, or dairy products they can use and what they need to have a balanced diet. Volunteers are important during our distributions.
During these times volunteers are utilized to help sign people in, bag their foods, or take their bags to their vehicles. But even after the distribution, there is still more work to be done. Trucks of food need to be unloaded, and shelves need to be cleaned and restocked before the next distribution.
Every year around the holiday’s families and individuals have traditions of going to their location shelters and giving food out to the homeless, but what about the rest of the year? Samaritan House serves dinner every night. Volunteers have an opportunity to serve dinner and interact with the people who come to eat. After dinner is served, there is some clean up to ensure the shelter is comfortable and ready for use the next day. Some volunteers engage our guests in board games or watch a particular program.
Samaritan House office always has some work that helps to keep the office running smoothly. Some papers need to be shredded, copies made, and files organized along with some other light office work. Sometimes we need loading and unloading donated items.
As you can see volunteers at Samaritan House are critical to meeting the needs of people. If you have any interest in helping us or would like to find out more about each of the programs, please call 505-454-1390 or email cmuniz3@live.com. Information about volunteering can also be found online at https://www.volunteermatch.org/search/?l=LasVegas,NM87701,USA