July 14, 2006

Unique volunteer organization Hands on Bay Area available to all

By Carol Rosen
Staff Writer

Many people in the Bay Area have probably never heard of Hands On Bay Area, but to the 10,000 or so members who want to volunteer their time and/or money, it’s a godsend.

Hands On Bay Area is an organization designed for anyone who has the inclination and a bit of time who want to help out. Its flexibility is a big advantage as is the ease of not having to be tied down to a specific activity each week at a certain time.

And, possibly most important, many, if not most, projects can be done by families so volunteers don’t have to beg spouses or family members to help out or hire an exorbitantly priced baby sitter.

“Hands On Bay Area offers volunteers the chance to do a little bit of everything with the idea that volunteering should be a joyful experience,” said Patrice Tardif, community programs director for Hands on Bay Area, who was a volunteer for about seven years before she joined the staff five years ago.

The organization works with about 300 different non-profit agencies throughout the Bay Area. It offers 120 projects each month, a significant number of which are here in the South Bay or on the Peninsula.

In addition, there are projects in San Francisco, as well as a good number of projects in Oakland, Berkeley, Hayward, Redwood City and East Palo Alto.

Before joining Hands On Bay Area, Tardif had been a mentor for four years with Lincoln High School. “When it ended, I wanted to try something else. Hands On offered me a wide variety of volunteer projects and it was simple to sign up, become a member and find out,” she said.

One of the things she really liked about the organization is that volunteers are never sent out by themselves. There always is a project leader there to greet volunteers and make sure they are having a good experience.

In addition, Tardif noted that it’s a great way to make children aware of others and situations and conditions different than their own. For example, some of the organizations include EHC Lifebuilder or Next Door Solutions to Prevent Domestic Violence, or doing projects such as planting flowers in the Rose Garden or other places around the Peninsula and San Jose. “It’s an easy way to learn and talk about social issues and discuss what can be done to solve some of these problems,” Tardif said.

Other activities can be fun days. For example, Hands On Bay Area recently worked a family day event at the Kantor Art Museum.

The group also is planning Hands On Bay Area Day. Set for Oct. 14, Tardif said the group expects about 2,000 people in downtown San Jose, East Palo Alto, San Francisco’s Civic Center and the Berkeley City Hall. Volunteers will receive packets including a T-shirt and a meal and then are off to one of 75 different programs including Sacred Heart Communities, Guadalupe Gardens and Books Aloud. The projects will be listed on the web site in August, and volunteers can sign up for them starting Sept. 1.

About 15 to 20 years ago, two organizations, Community Impact in the South Bay and Peninsula and Hands on San Francisco, both began evolving in specific areas. The founders of Community Impact, three Stanford University graduate students—Steve Rosston (who is still on the board), Peggy Propp and Jane Woodward—started looking for local opportunities to do volunteer work as a group, said Tardif.

The three wanted to volunteer but couldn’t make a long-term commitment and wanted to work with their friends. Both groups started out with about 20 members.

They remained separate organizations until December 2003, when the executive director of Hands On San Francisco left. That group contacted Community Impact and the two—realizing they didn’t need to compete for volunteers—merged officially in April 2004 and became part of the Hands On Network, which contains 56 groups nationally and in other countries, including the United Kingdom, South Africa and the Philippines. The group now has about 10,000 volunteers throughout the Bay Area.

“I’ve seen a number of corporate mergers,” said Tardif, “and none went as smoothly as this one. People on both sides were willing to give up and to gain things knowing that it was all for the communities.”

Hands On is always looking for more agencies to help. In order to get on the list, the agency must contact Hands On Bay Area, which then sets up a site visit and analyzes what is necessary and how to best use volunteers. All of this is free, and Hands On Bay Area does not send out volunteers to solicit donations.

A number of corporations work with Hands On Bay Area, according to Tardif. These include Cisco Systems, Accenture, The Gap, Levi-Strauss, Semantek, the law firm of Wilson, Soncini, Goodrich and Rosato, and Hewlett Packard. The corporations offer volunteers monetary and in-kind donations. For example, 3Com gave phones to the Hands On Bay Area staff.

Corporate programs typically are custom designed, according to Tardif. Often it’s a specific day, with an unseen benefit of team building. A project is designed to meet the corporation’s needs and the volunteers spend the day helping others. “Most people leave knowing they did something great in the community,” she said.

People who are interested in volunteering can go to the web site www.handsonbayarea.org and go through a short online orientation [beginning Aug. 1], check out the projects and sign up online.

For those volunteers who would want to do more, there is a leadership development program. Tardif said that all projects are led by volunteer project leaders who go through an initial training program and then to on-going training. These volunteers work with the groups to develop and lead projects. After their initial training, project leaders conduct projects four to five times per year.

To join Hands On Bay Area, or would to find out more information about the program, visit www.handsonbayarea.org.