Building a community of volunteers

We're founded on service. Service, I think, is the most effective way to unify people, and goodness knows, our country needs that right now.”

Brian Baird

Edmonds is a community of volunteers. You can find them at the Edmonds Food Bank and the Edmonds Waterfront Center. At Rotary and Kiwanis Club meetings and events. Through the work of veterans who form the backbone of the VFW, which annually distributes $6,000 in student scholarships.

Now, volunteering in Edmonds is ready to move to the next level. A new volunteer initiative, Edmonds Serves, aims to connect community service across the city. Launched during a recent gathering of nonprofits, businesses, government, media, education, and faith-based groups at the Edmonds Waterfront Center, the program’s goal is to spotlight the businesses and groups who sustain the city while encouraging broader participation in volunteerism.

It also helps spotlight the groups that recruit and train staff and volunteers.

The program is scheduled to roll out through a six-week campaign beginning May 30, with a formal public launch planned June 6. During that time, participating organizations and businesses will display posters featuring volunteers and provide information on how others can get involved.

“I went on the IRS website to find out how many nonprofits there are in Edmonds,” said Mayor Mike Rosen, addressing the 200 or so people in the audience. “There are 480 exempt organizations here, just in the city; obviously that's a big cross-section of organizations that can be exempt. If we aren't the greatest (city) per capita, I want to see who could take a run at us. We've got to be in the top three.”

Program coordinator Erica Sugg said participation is designed to be simple and accessible.

“We recognize that you all are very busy people,” she said. “What’s wonderful about this initiative is its simplicity. We’re really only asking for a couple of hours of investment in your time to prepare some materials.”

Organizations can contribute by creating posters featuring their work or volunteers, which local businesses and venues can display. Some participants, such as community centers, may serve both roles.

National vision

Brian Baird, Edmonds resident and a former member of the U.S. Congress, founded and is executive director of the National Museum and Center for Service (nmcfs.org). Baird’s goal: making all forms of service to others visible and valued in every community and school in the nation, and in a future signature space in the nation’s capital.

Baird said Edmonds is the first “Community of Service” – a big push for the National Museum and Center for Service – in the nation. He described the Edmonds effort as the first step in creating “communities of service” across the country, where volunteerism is publicly recognized and embedded into everyday life.

The concept includes turning public spaces into what he called “community museums of service,” featuring stories and images of local volunteers and organizations.

“We are a nation founded on service. We don't talk about that a lot, but if you look at our founding documents, the Declaration of Independence closes with the phrase, ‘We mutually pledge each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred honor.’  The whole reason our country was born was the idea that people can govern and serve one another respectfully and for the common good. But it's not just that. We're founded on service. Service, I think, is the most effective way to unify people, and goodness knows, our country needs that right now.”

When you hear someone say “Thank you for service,” it's assumed to mean military service.

“We should absolutely thank them,” Baird said. “But how can we broaden our definition and broaden the ways in which we honor? People from all walks of life can serve. It doesn't matter your ethnicity, your gender, your faith. Too often, when we honor service, we do so on one service day a year or through an award that reaches maybe one person. But as you know, every day in Edmonds there are hundreds of people serving, from the garden club to the food bank, to various other organizations.”

As part of his volunteering efforts, Baird has also created a national movement called 250 and Beyond to coincide with America’s 250th anniversary of its founding and the Declaration of Independence.

“It's an independent, community, locally driven effort,” Baird said, “to celebrate this historic legacy of service that the United States really has often been the leader of the world.”

Volunteers

Todd Tatum, Edmonds’ Interim Acting city administrator, said his veteran service and longtime public service reflected on how his understanding of service evolved. Initially associating service solely with the military, he said his perspective broadened after experiences overseas and later in civilian life.

“I met people who were serving in ways that I had never imagined,” he said, describing civilians risking their lives to support communities in conflict zones.

Returning home, he said he was struck by the contrast in recognition. “From the time I left the jet bridge, we received a standing ovation,” he said of arriving at an airport after deployment. “I thought so much about the people who were still overseas that would never get this recognition.”

That realization shaped his appreciation for everyday volunteers. “It’s incredible what you do,” he told the audience. “And it’s not a small thing. It’s huge.” He added that one of his hopes for the initiative is to inspire younger generations. “I hope most from this is that a little kid sees these posters (around the room) and says, ‘That sounds like something that I want to be part of.’”

No one exemplifies volunteerism in Edmonds more than Phillip “Smitty” Smithson. Smithson has decades of volunteer experience with organizations such as the Special Olympics and the Edmonds Bank.

“Volunteering, to me, is giving freely of yourself for the benefit of others in need,” he said.

At the food bank, he described connections with both recipients and fellow volunteers, from delivering groceries to homebound residents to working with a diverse and dedicated team.

These two acts of volunteering give me joy. They give me a sense of belonging and a sense of purpose. In my 47 years of volunteering, I can truly say I have received far more than I gave.”