Volunteerism Project Gets a Helping Hand

In setting their 1994 agenda, directors of the fledgling Los Angeles Volunteerism Project had pinpointed disaster response as a priority.

But when the Northridge earthquake jolted Los Angeles awake Jan. 17, the luxury of planning disappeared.

“So when this happened it was, ‘Uh oh. The horse was out of the barn before we built the barn,’ ” said Pat Paolilli, director of the project.

The nonprofit Volunteerism Project, which started in late fall and handled its quake relief efforts from the Panorama City office of the Volunteer Center of the San Fernando Valley, was designed to coordinate six privately funded volunteer centers in Los Angeles County. The aim is to increase volunteerism throughout the region.

The project was modeled after a San Francisco program that increased community volunteering by 45% in three years. The San Francisco project worked out a disaster plan for that area in response to the Loma Prieta quake, but the Los Angeles group had not gotten that far.

“So we just started working,” Paolilli said. “Our colleagues in San Francisco faxed us some plans.”

The project brings together the volunteer centers of the San Fernando Valley, Greater Pomona Valley, Los Angeles , La Mirada, San Gabriel Valley and South Bay-Harbor-Long Beach.

In the days after the quake, volunteers from all six centers filed into the San Fernando Valley center in Panorama City.

By Thursday, 10 telephone lines had been installed and calls from people wanting to volunteer and agencies needing manpower starting pouring in.

“By Friday noon it was clear to us we were under-phoned. So we ordered 20 more lines,” Paolilli said.

In the 36 days it took calls, the hot line matched 3,600 volunteers with about 600 agencies that asked for help, said Suzanne Lewis, the center’s spokeswoman.

Now that the immediate crisis is over, operators are monitoring the phones until Friday, taking messages and suggesting volunteering opportunities.