River of Refuge newsletter, April 2024

Volunteer Finds ‘A Village’ at River of Refuge

A Tennessee native, a graduate of a Presbyterian college in Florida, and a one-time New Yorker.

Chicago is also part of that list, but Marian Hogins, 78, finally put down permanent roots in Kansas City, Missouri, when she married four decades ago. A wanderer no more, Hogins has found River of Refuge to be a rewarding niche in her adopted hometown. She volunteers once a week.

“If we’re lucky, we find villages, lots of different places in our lives,” Hogins said. “And River of Refuge has become a village … where I can be helpful and that is supportive of me. And I can feel like I am being useful to the maintenance of that village and useful to the other residents of that village, and it’s doing a wonderful thing.”

With a background in healthcare administration, Hogins is a perfect fit for helping to manage client paperwork. She retired in 2016 from Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care.

Hogins learned about River of Refuge through a newspaper article that detailed the work of founder John Wiley. Still working in hospice, Hogins thought, “Wow, that is a place I want to be involved with.”

As fate would have it, Hogins met River of Refuge volunteer David Showalter years later through a breakfast group. He connected Hogins with Executive Director Pam Seymour, and that was that.

Hogins retains the strong sense of social justice that was part of her upbringing as the daughter and granddaughter of Methodist ministers. But she also keeps in her cell phone a passage from the Jewish Talmud that urges readers to press on with justice and mercy despite the weight of the world’s problems.

“You are not obligated to complete the work,” the commentary concludes, “but neither are you free to abandon it.”

To Hogins it is immoral and inexcusable that people live in cars and on the streets when there is so much empty land and buildings.

With its zero tolerance for substance abuse and a heavy emphasis on budgeting, Hogins knows parents can struggle with the River of Refuge program.

“Sometimes bad luck and trouble bring families here,” she said. “And sometimes families come missing some skills and missing knowledge pieces, and I think this agency works really hard to provide support systems, and skills, and knowledge.”

After all, it takes a village.

 

We’re Hiring!

Please consider joining our small, but mighty, team at River of Refuge. See the listings below for our two open positions. If interested, please email a cover letter and resume to pamela@riverofrefuge.com

Part-Time Administrative Assistant
This is a 20-32 hour-per-week administrative assistant position.

Duties:

• Manage general correspondence
• Compile and distribute various reports
• Handle routine telephone calls
• Assist in planning, organizing, and providing support for special events; this may include being on-site for events
• Manage and maintain social media
• Provide administrative services
• Maintain office supplies
• Data input and management of the CRM database – Little Green Light
• Other duties as assigned

Administrative Assistant job description

Night Manager
This is a non-paying opportunity that provides you with a free apartment, utilities, wifi, secure parking, and washers and dryers. In exchange for housing and utilities, the manager will volunteer ten hours a week, plus manage childcare with another night manager three evenings per week. You must be drug and alcohol-free at all times and pass a background screening.

Duties:

• Educates program members on the policies and procedures of the program upon intake
• Enforces program rules/policies and holds program members accountable for their behavior by reporting actions to the case manager or program manager
• Builds relationships with the program members in the transitional housing program
• Assists program members in developing relationships with each other
• Helps facilitate an environment that allows program members to meet their program goals
• Models positive attitudes and behaviors
• Supports the case managers/program manager by providing assistance for program members in need during non-business hours
• Supports the value and mission of the transitional housing program and organization
• Conducts the intake process and assists the program member when exiting the program
• Documents policy violations and reports infractions to the case manager or program manager
• Conducts checks for cleanliness and contraband of the family units weekly or more frequently if requested by the case manager or program manager
• Reports maintenance and facility concerns to the case manager, program manager, or facilities manager
• Other duties as assigned by the program manager

Night manager job description

 

FROM THE DIRECTOR

In April 1974, President Richard Nixon called on his fellow citizens to devote at least a few hours a week to help a “needy individual or worthy cause” within their community.

Roughly a decade later another Republican president, George H.W. Bush, laid out his vision for national volunteerism as a “thousand points of light.”

The resulting Points of Light Foundation expanded on the notion of a national volunteer week by proclaiming April as Global Volunteer Month. The goal is to “recognize the power of people who work tirelessly in communities around the world to create social change,” Points of Light CEO Jennifer Sirangelo said recently.

River of Refuge embraces the opportunity to celebrate our volunteers, such as Marian Hogins, whom we profiled in our lead story this month.

Volunteers are the heart and soul of every small nonprofit. With just four full-time employees and one part-time staffer, River of Refuge would not have near the impact we do without our dedicated volunteers.

Last year alone, River of Refuge benefitted from more than 2,130 volunteer hours, including the equivalent of nearly a full workweek donated by a mental health professional who assesses adults as they move into the ROR program. The volunteer hours equated to an in-kind contribution of approximately $37,000 based on the average Missouri volunteer hourly rate.

Working with volunteers has been one of the most rewarding aspects of my 17-year career as a nonprofit professional. I have maintained friendships with many volunteers even after they moved out of town or stepped away when other aspects of their lives got too busy.

At River of Refuge, Marian has been such a blessing and we feel lost if she has a Friday off.

David, also mentioned above and featured in a previous newsletter, has been volunteering with the organizations where I have worked since he retired some years ago. He currently volunteers on Wednesdays and some weekends, depending on our needs.

One of my earliest nonprofit colleagues, Gwen, has volunteered for me for years and even talked her husband, John, into helping at ROR. They are moving to Vermont to be closer to their daughter and grandchildren. They have been talking about this move for a few years, but it’s real now, and we are going to miss the couple in our pantries every Thursday.

We have a community volunteer gathering on the third Thursday of each month from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. We’re never sure how many will show up. It can be as few as four or as many as two dozen. Regardless of the numbers, there is never a shortage of things to keep volunteers busy.

The U.S. Census Bureau reported last year that, even during the pandemic, nearly a quarter of Americans ages 16 and older formally volunteered through an organization. Approximately half of the respondents said they had informally helped a neighbor during the height of COVID-19.

It seems the volunteer spirit is very much alive in our country, and we routinely see it here at ROR.

Thank you, volunteers! We couldn’t do the work we do without you!

Until Next Time,
Pamela Seymour, Executive Director