By Justin Goulet (@JustinGoulet21)

Volunteers in Lethbridge celebrated as part of National Volunteer Week

Apr 9, 2019 | 11:32 AM

LETHBRIDGE, AB – Community helpers are being recognized for their hard work.

Across Canada, it’s National Volunteer Week.

“This is a time where we can celebrate and thank Canada’s 12.7 million volunteers,” said Chelsea Eastman, event and resource development coordinator with Volunteer Lethbridge.

She noted that there’s numerous volunteer dinners and award ceremonies happening across the country to honour volunteers.

“This year, Volunteer Canada’s theme is ‘The Volunteer Factor – Lifting Communities’. We use that theme to create different events and different things we can do for the volunteers,” she said.

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“In Lethbridge, what we’ve done is reached out to a number of local businesses that have electronic digital display boards and we’ve invited them to share a thank you message to the volunteers.”

Residents will be able to spot signs that read “Thank you #YQL volunteers” around the city.

“We also have a Leaders of Tomorrow gala tomorrow (Wednesday) evening where we recognize and celebrate the youth in the community with a dinner, an awards ceremony and a band, so it’s really nice for them,” Eastman added.

VOLUNTEER LETHBRIDGE

Eastman explained that Volunteer Lethbridge aims to support the non-profit sector.

“We really focus on building capacity to other non-profits in the community,” she said.

“We work with lots of businesses, non-profits, organizations to help champion the volunteer sector and leverage services and resources, and bring people together providing different workshops or one-on-one support, supporting with granting and funding opportunities, just going out into the community and raising awareness as well – just really anything that we can do to help support the non-profit sector.”

Eastman noted that last year, there were over 24,000 volunteers in Lethbridge, which equated to about more than 625,000 hours of volunteer service.

There are many volunteer opportunities in Lethbridge, including working with animals, seniors, a sports organization or youth. Eastman said the food bank is always looking for community helpers.

“We’re always here to support individuals and to educate them and provide them with resources, but ultimately it will be up to the volunteer to contact the agency and ask them if they have volunteer opportunities – or, if they saw a posting elsewhere, they can talk to them about that posting.”

Many opportunities are posted on Volunteer Lethbridge’s website. Eastman said they receive over 150 clicks on their website every day just through the volunteer opportunity board.

National Volunteer Week 2019 is on until Saturday, April 13.