Volunteer Spotlight: Jorge + Stephen
Volunteers Jorge and Stephen met while volunteering at the Food Bank on Saturdays. You can count on these friends to be there each weekend helping to sort and pack food, load delivery vehicles, or tend to any tasks that are needed, and have some fun and laughs along the way.
Thank you both for your dedication to this community!!
Meet Jorge Montesinos
When did you start volunteering at the Food Bank?
July 2022.
What are your typical volunteer responsibilities?
Helping with home deliveries is the main task I help with. The Food Bank has a list of people who receive a box filled with food each week. Every Saturday, I help the drivers who pick them up, making sure each box being picked up matches the list while assisting drivers to load and with directions.
What is your favorite part about volunteering?
Volunteers and staff have a great sense of camaraderie; times go by very quickly when you work with friendly and kind-hearted folks! Another aspect I enjoy very much involves translating for some of the drivers who show up to pick up weekly boxes. It is very rewarding to help some members of the immigrant community feel welcome as I can translate and even share a few laughs in Spanish.
Why should others volunteer at the Food Bank?
The Food Bank’s mission is essential for the community as it steadily tackles such a pressing matter as food insecurity in Seattle. Everyone can help! There are many ways to do so, from greeting customers, organizing deliveries, cleaning, etc. Plus, you get to know and share your time with a truly wonderful and fun group of people!
What else do you want people to know about our Food Bank community?
There is room for everyone at the Food Bank. You can find teens working with their parents, corporate executives, church groups, and retired people. Each one has an interesting story behind to tell about why they are helping the Food Bank. In a way, each story offers a unique angle to a problem such as food insecurity in Seattle and the United States. In this sense, volunteering at the Food Bank feels good and it is a non-conventional educational experience.
Meet Stephen Rodas
When did you start volunteering at the Food Bank?
October 2022
What are your typical volunteer responsibilities?
On Saturdays: making sure that the correct boxes are loaded for the drivers as quickly and efficiently as possible. Those noon and 1 o’clock rushes can be quite hectic. Any shift I work during the week I just float to what’s needed (greet, stock, sort, etc.).
What is your favorite part about volunteering?
Bothering the fellow volunteers and wonderful employees at the food bank!
Why should others volunteer at the Food Bank?
The volunteers and workers at the food bank are all such awesome people, it’s incredibly fun and rewarding to help others in even the smallest capacity, and there’s free coffee.
What else do you want people to know about our Food Bank community?
There’s also free snacks for volunteers 🙂
