Volunteerism
Griffin Tracy
Dr. Lisa Briggs
ABSTRACT
Volunteers help not because it is required of them, but out of the
kindness of their hearts as human beings. Every volunteer has their own
specific reason for wanting to help, it might be because they lost a loved
one and want to honor their name, they just enjoy helping others, or
maybe even because they need service hours for some reason. This study
looks to analyze volunteers during Hurricane Florence, what they did, and
how people helped through organizations or individuals. There are many
different ways for people to get involved to help their community and
others, such as joining a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), going out
on their own and just looking for people who need help that they can
provide. Volunteers are a critical piece to response and recovery because
paid responders such as first responders, Federal Emergency Management
Agency (FEMA), and other paying organizations do not have the funds to
pay everyone that is needed to respond to a disaster.
INTRO / GOALS / OBJECTIVES
A disaster is an event that overwhelms a local and state government
from responding to the event so it requires federal assistance to step in
and help out with this response. NGOs usually accompany any sort of
response effort that is put forward no matter if it is just an emergency,
disaster, or even a catastrophe. It is important to know how people can get
involved to volunteer, and what volunteers do for the community, which
makes them such a valued tool to response and recovery operations.
The objectives that this study hopes to fulfill is to understand the role
of volunteers, how to get involved, and what the advantages of volunteers
are over paid responders. If the public understands how to get involved
and volunteer than that will help streamline the process of getting
someone involved and also make it much less of a daunting task due to
the fact that most people do not know what to do to try to get involved
especially in a time of disaster. With the advantage of more volunteers at
the disposal of emergency managers this will help the emergency manager
understand what the real needs of the community are because they are
working with locals, and the locals will know how to properly handle
things specific to their community once they have the resources needed to
help.
METHODS
Research consists of personal interviews, government websites,
volunteer organization websites, and news paper websites. The governor's
office assistant explains how many volunteers were operational during and
after Hurricane Florence and what their roles were. FEMA.gov gives a
detailed table of their pay rates due to different job titles, rankings, and
even pay grades. The International Federation of Red Cross gives a
description of what a disaster is and what causes a disaster. CBSNews.com
gives numbers for how expensive it was to respond and recover to
Hurricane Florence compared to other major hurricanes of this century
and how they match up to each other.
.This figure shows this path of Hurricane Florence after it made landfall
and where it ended up going. With this information volunteer groups know
what areas were affected the most and where groups need to focus their
recourses and people for the best possible response efforts.
Responders Prepare for Work
Paid and volunteer first responders prepare to go to work and serve their
community. First responders came from all over the state to help with
recovery efforts after Hurricane Florence struck.
RESULTS CONCLUSIONS AND
Through the research performed this study has concluded that there
RECOMMENDATIONS
was a major lack of volunteers, especially during and after Hurricane Volunteers are a greatly needed recourse in a time of disaster due to
Florence. Disasters, such as Hurricane Florence, require volunteers their zero cost and efficiency to take care of smaller tasks and relieve
because as described by the international federation of Red Cross a pressure from other rescue workers. Volunteers are an integral part of our
disaster is an event that seriously infringes upon daily life of a community society and help to strengthen the community and the community bonds
and requires more assistance than the local government can provide especially during a time of need and hurt.
(n.d.). The government is limited to their response efforts by the budget • More media coverage of pre-event through post-event efforts;
and how much money and resources can be allocated at one time to any • Establish easy access to information on how to volunteer;
certain event or area. American Red Cross volunteers provided ninety-two • Have pre-established community volunteer groups before a disaster
percent of the one-hundred twenty-seven-thousand seven-hundred hits;
volunteers of Hurricane Florence, one point six million meals and snacks • Inform volunteers that their services are greatly appreciated and not
across eight states (n.d.). The government can not support all the unnoticed;
resources and help needed to respond to a disaster of this magnitude
alone because the average Federal Emergency Management Agency
References
(FEMA) reservist can make anywhere from mid-twenties to mid-thirties. If
McCausland, P., (2018) Volunteer group’s effort highlights the thousands
the government had to pay all one-hundred twenty-seven-thousand
seven-hundred volunteers for just one hour of their services that would
still in need after Hurricane Florence. NBC News. Retrieved from
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/volunteer-group-s-effort-
cost the government an added three-million eight-hundred-thirty-one-
highlights-thousands-still-need-after-hurricane-n912211
thousand dollars in the budget. This estimate is for one hour of the
hundreds of thousands of hours put in by some of these dedicated
“2014 pay Grade” (2014) 2014 pay grade reservist distribution. FEMA.
volunteers, so the cost could be anywhere in the billions, if not hundreds
Retrieved from https://www.fema.gov/media-
of billions. There has been an observed correlation to the number of
library/assets/documents/94417
volunteers during and after a disaster and the amount of media coverage
given to the disaster before, during, and after the event. As noted in CBS
“Hurricane Florence Response” (n.d.) Hurricane Florence response in
News writer Ed Leefeldts article Hurricane Florence could be the costliest
eastern North Carolina. American Red Cross. Retrieved from
storm ever to hit the U.S., Hurricane Florence received over one-hundred
https://www.redcross.org/local/north-carolina/eastern-north-
seventy-billion dollars for response and recovery efforts compared to
carolina/about-us/our-work/hurricane-florence-response.html
Hurricane Katrina's one-hundred sixty-billion dollars and Hurricane
Michael's over one-hundred-billions dollars for recovery and response.
Leefeldt, E., (2018) Hurricane Florence could be costliest storm ever to hit
This correlation between media and amounts of funding for response and
the U.S.. CBS News. Retrieved from
recovery efforts is important because the reason behind why there are
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hurricane-florence-could-be-costliest-
more funding could be anything from seeing the devastation to hearing of
hurricane-ever-to-hit-the-u-s/
different groups that are looking for funding to support survivors and
response efforts (2018).
What is a disaster? (n.d.) What is a disaster?. International Federation of
Red Cross. Retrieved from https://www.ifrc.org/en/what-we-do/disaster-
management/about-disasters/what-is-a-disaster/
Emergency and Disaster Management Program