I am about half-way through my program with Leadership St. Petersburg. It's been a really great experience so far and we are starting our final push to complete the class project. The project is a renovation of the CASA shelter in St. Petersburg. For those not familiar with CASA, it is a not-for-profit organization founded over 25 years ago. The name is an acronym for Community Action Stops Abuse and it's mission is to raise our voices against violence through advocacy, empowerment, and social change.
Many of the people CASA helps are fleeing a domestic environment that is physically abusive. They seek temporary shelter, transitional housing and support for themselves and often time, their children.
You can help this organization in many ways, including volunteering as an advocate, child care assistant, life skills coach, community educator or thrift shoppe assistant. For some of these positions you will need to submit to a background check and be certified. Others you do not. For more information, check out their website at:
http://www.casa-stpete.org
Another way to support CASA is by helping me to raise money for the Leadership St. Pete class project. We are raising money to renovate several rooms in the CASA shelter and need both cash and materials donations. The labor is being done by my class and I'll be getting my hands dirty, along with the rest of my 2010 LSP classmates.
CASA and Leadership St. Petersburg representatives were recently on the 10Connects program, Studio 10 to discuss the project and the work done by the CASA organization. Here is a link to that show segment.
http://www.studio10.tv/video/segment.aspx/126173/99766/Leadership_St_Pete_Give_CASA_a/Help_Support_CASA.asx.
Your cash donation it would really help out. Every dollar counts so if you can give $10, that's great. My goal is to raise $400.00. I'm donating both time and money for this project and I will apply to my corporate employer, the Gannett Corporation, for matching funds. That way we can double our donations so a $20 donation from you is actually a $40.00 and that's 10 percent of my goal. I will get a letter from CASA for all donations so you can get the tax write-off.
You can send me a check, or go to the Leadership St. Petersburg website and donate using a credit card.
http://www.leadership.stpete.com
Any help will be appreciated by me as well as those who get shelter from CASA. It's a great opportunity to give to those less fortunate and helping a worthy cause always makes you feel good. If you have any questions call me at 727.252.8540 and thank you again.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Tampa Bay Watch
Tampa Bay Watch is an organization, based right here in the Tampa Bay area, to which everyone interested in helping the environment should belong. It's located at the tip of Pinellas County, adjacent to Ft. DeSoto Park and I first got involved with them last year, through a partnership they have with 10Connects, the CBS Television Station here. TBW is a watchdog for the Tampa Bay estuary and is involved with scores of projects each year to restore and enrich our marine habitat. Over the course of a typical year they conduct salt marsh restoration, the Great Bay Scallop search, derilect crab trap removal, storm water drain marking, coastal clean ups, barrier reef creation with Oyster Domes and more. One trip to their website, http://www.tampabaywatch.org/ will give you details on their current projects. Most of these require volunteers.
Watch these two videos, featuring Peter Clark, the executive director of TBW. In the first one, Peter gives a great overview of the organization, the importance of volunteers and individual membership. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRextTW8hgY. In the second he takes us on a tour of the site where oyster domes are made. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QonM668HH_4. One note: I shot these videos myself and they are the first ones using an HD Flip Video I recently purchased. They are a little rough so I'm going to figure out how to edit video better. My future video posting on this blog will be cleaner.
Watch these two videos, featuring Peter Clark, the executive director of TBW. In the first one, Peter gives a great overview of the organization, the importance of volunteers and individual membership. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRextTW8hgY. In the second he takes us on a tour of the site where oyster domes are made. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QonM668HH_4. One note: I shot these videos myself and they are the first ones using an HD Flip Video I recently purchased. They are a little rough so I'm going to figure out how to edit video better. My future video posting on this blog will be cleaner.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
I Participate
Hello!
Everyone is very busy during December and volunteering is not always high on our priority lists. We get busy with friends and family, celebrating the holiday season, and other interests get delayed. Now, however, is a great chance to start laying groundwork that can help you start the new year ready to help others in your community.
One of the easiest ways to get started is to go to a website called iparticipate.org. This is a site with national scope and was created and is maintained by the Entertainment Industry Foundation. You can see how celebrities like Faith Hill, Gwenyth Paltrow and John Bon Jovi are making the world a better place through volunteerism. And more importantly, on the home page you will see seven speed buttons that will take you to different causes. They are: The Movement, Well-Being, Education and Children, Community Health, Environment Conservation, Financial Security and Support for Military Families. Click one of them and you be directed to a page that contains information on national, non-profit organizations that do great work and provide opportunities for involvement.
For instance, under the Environment Conservation page you will find an organization called Alliance for Community Trees. This is a organization helps to protect community forests by planting trees in cities all over the country. According to the site, ACT members have planted over 7.8 million trees and engaged more than 450,000 volunteers! There are places on that page to get become a friend of ACT and join The Neighborwoods Network. And there are other sites on this page that serve this cause as well
But the best part of the site is that is has a local tie in. Once you're at the homepage, the site knows your physical location and provides a search box to help locate volunteer organizations that need your help now. I live on Clearwater Beach and when I typed the word "Nature" into the search box, I got several pages of organizations in the Clearwater area that support the conservation cause. One was Adopt-a-Park. They look for businesses and individuals to help work with the Clearwater City Parks Department to revitalize parks in my neighborhood. They will provide the materials, volunteers provide sweat equity. Others included docent opportunities at Booker Creek Park and Weedon Island Preserve.
I find this to be a very helpful site and I'm sure it can help you start a volunteer journey or enhance the efforts you already have underway. The important thing is find a cause that you are passionate about, find an organization that supports that cause and get involved in some way.
Starting next time, I'm going to showcase a local organization that does great work to help our community and ways you can get involved. We are fortunate to live in a wonderful place like Tampa, St. Petersburg and the surrounding Bay Area. It provides us with such a great quality of life and there is no better time than now to start giving back.
Everyone is very busy during December and volunteering is not always high on our priority lists. We get busy with friends and family, celebrating the holiday season, and other interests get delayed. Now, however, is a great chance to start laying groundwork that can help you start the new year ready to help others in your community.
One of the easiest ways to get started is to go to a website called iparticipate.org. This is a site with national scope and was created and is maintained by the Entertainment Industry Foundation. You can see how celebrities like Faith Hill, Gwenyth Paltrow and John Bon Jovi are making the world a better place through volunteerism. And more importantly, on the home page you will see seven speed buttons that will take you to different causes. They are: The Movement, Well-Being, Education and Children, Community Health, Environment Conservation, Financial Security and Support for Military Families. Click one of them and you be directed to a page that contains information on national, non-profit organizations that do great work and provide opportunities for involvement.
For instance, under the Environment Conservation page you will find an organization called Alliance for Community Trees. This is a organization helps to protect community forests by planting trees in cities all over the country. According to the site, ACT members have planted over 7.8 million trees and engaged more than 450,000 volunteers! There are places on that page to get become a friend of ACT and join The Neighborwoods Network. And there are other sites on this page that serve this cause as well
But the best part of the site is that is has a local tie in. Once you're at the homepage, the site knows your physical location and provides a search box to help locate volunteer organizations that need your help now. I live on Clearwater Beach and when I typed the word "Nature" into the search box, I got several pages of organizations in the Clearwater area that support the conservation cause. One was Adopt-a-Park. They look for businesses and individuals to help work with the Clearwater City Parks Department to revitalize parks in my neighborhood. They will provide the materials, volunteers provide sweat equity. Others included docent opportunities at Booker Creek Park and Weedon Island Preserve.
I find this to be a very helpful site and I'm sure it can help you start a volunteer journey or enhance the efforts you already have underway. The important thing is find a cause that you are passionate about, find an organization that supports that cause and get involved in some way.
Starting next time, I'm going to showcase a local organization that does great work to help our community and ways you can get involved. We are fortunate to live in a wonderful place like Tampa, St. Petersburg and the surrounding Bay Area. It provides us with such a great quality of life and there is no better time than now to start giving back.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Give Back Now!
Welcome to my Web Log. The purpose of this blog is to share my experiences with an organization I'm part of, Leadership St. Petersburg. Additionally I'm going to present volunteer opportunities with non-profit organizations throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Many people would like to donate their time or money or both to a cause they believe in. Unfortunately it can be hard to find organizations that share those beliefs. This blog can provide exposure for these organizations and contact information to help link them with volunteers.
These are difficult economic times and if everyone could just donate a little time, money or whatever they have our community would be so much better off.
My journey with Leadership St. Petersburg is just beginning. I've already met many people who hold diverse positions with our community and will use this space to provide insight into the people and experiences that come from the LSP program. Join me on this journey. Be open to volunteerism, especially for good organizations and causes. It will make you feel good and we could all use a little "feel good" right now. Stay tuned.
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