After not meeting as a group since January 2020, senior volunteers who serve at Hope Unlimited and the Allen County Food Pantry met in Iola for a recognition lunch on Thursday at Sam and Louie’s.
Local volunteers are part of AmeriCorps Seniors which includes the Retired Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP). Hope Unlimited volunteers help sort donated items, serve at the blood drive, and make sewing projects. Allen County Food Pantry volunteers coordinate food distribution at the 16 W. Broadway St. in Iola.
The AmeriCorps Seniors RSVP program provides grants to organizations with a dual purpose: to engage Americans 55 years and older in volunteer service to meet critical community needs, and to provide a high-quality experience for the volunteers.
RSVP is one of the agency’s most flexible grant programs. Organizations determine where the need is greatest and how volunteers can respond to the need as long as it falls within one of AmeriCorps’ six focus areas: disaster services, economic opportunity, environmental stewardship, education, healthy futures and veterans and military members.
Locally, the focus was on healthy futures and food distribution. Neosho County Community College is the sponsor of the program through a grant from AmeriCorps Seniors.
Anyone 55 and older interested in volunteering in Allen, Bourbon, Neosho or Woodson counties can contact Sandy Haggard, RSVP Director, 620-432-0422, at her office at NCCC in Chanute, or email [email protected].
