Page 34 - August 2016 Life In Naples Magazine

The joy of giving back
with Volunteer Collier

by Spencer Smith

United Way of Collier County

V olunteer Collier isn’t just a catchy name;
it’s United Way of Collier County’s
grassroots program dedicated to the
improvement of our community. In addition to

posting a plethora of volunteer opportunities

on their website, such as tutoring, lifeguarding,

and food distribution, they also coordinate with

a wide variety of charities to help those in need.

Volunteer Collier focuses on making it easy

for anyone to find volunteer work that is both

engaging and rewarding at charities and civic

organizations. Community partnerships make DON SCOTT

Volunteer Collier the most comprehensive source

for volunteer opportunities in Collier County.

Beyond that, United Way staff work to organize

large-scale projects for companies, churches and His first attempt to volunteer made him aware of a missing component.
civic organizations.
Agencies were having a difficult time getting the word out to volunteers and
Last December, Volunteer Collier partnered volunteers didn’t know where the real needs of the community were. Scott’s
with the Ritz Carlton and Meals of Hope on a solution was Volunteer Collier, A Points of Light/HandsOn Network
food drive where over 100 volunteers worked supported volunteer matching website which bridged the gap between
to prepare 40,176 meals to feed the hungry in the agency and community needs. Acting as a one-stop-shop for any
Collier. Other projects have included Fifth Third volunteering needs, Volunteer Collier allows its partnered charities to be
Bank employees repainting Guadalupe Center’s more efficient by saving both time and money when looking for volunteers.
thrift store, Xfinity/Comcast employees wrapping The staff and volunteers at Volunteer Collier don’t just talk the talk - they
presents for the children at Youth Haven and walk the walk. They are dedicated to improving the county for everyone,
BMO Harris Bank employees working with and that means continuing to improve Volunteer Collier. For example, in
children in the classroom at Children’s Home 2015 the program participants grew from 850 registered volunteers to 1560;
Society. Even with just a glimpse of the programs an 84 percent increase in the number of people serving in our community.
and opportunities Volunteer Collier provides, These new volunteers possess different skills and talents, which has allowed
it is hard to imagine Collier County without Volunteer Collier to expand their scope of opportunities. The number of
them. However, had it not been for the leadership registered non-profits went from 100 to 188; an 88 percent increase in the
of Don Scott, we may have never had this core span of one year. To give these numbers some perspective, in 2015 there
community program.
were 3,414 volunteer hours logged. Since the average dollar value of one
Inspired by his faith and by former President hour of a volunteer’s time is $22 (2015 Bureau of Labor Statistics data,
George H.W. Bush’s notion that volunteer indexed by Independent Sector in April 2016), we can calculate that Collier
organizations are like 1,000 points of light citizens invested more than $75,000 dollars of service into their community.
through which we can build our community and Considering that the program nearly doubled the number of volunteers
solve local problems, Don decided to volunteer. and opened more doors for new volunteers, 2016 and the years to come are

going to bring more exciting growth.

We’ve only just scratched the surface of what United Way and Volunteer

Collier bring to our community, and much more detailed info can be

found on the website at www.volunteercollier.org. There you can find the

Opportunity Calendar, which lists upcoming events and volunteer options,

as well as portals to assistance or volunteer programs.

34 Life in Naples | August • September • October 2016