Volunteering at Redwood

by | Oct 21, 2020 | Blog

This is a guest post written by our new Volunteer Coordinator, Tanya Saari. We are thrilled to have Tanya come on board to help us get more organized and make the Redwood volunteering experience the best it can be!
Hello! My name is Tanya Saari, and I’m the new Volunteer Coordinator with Redwood Park Communities after being a Redwood volunteer myself for about two years.
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I’ve lived in Barrie for 16 years, I’m married, and I’m the mom to three kids ages 21, 18, and 16.

As a Realtor, I see the struggles people face finding affordable housing, and I want to be part of the solution. I believe in Redwood park Communities and the mandate of building safe, affordable, hopeful housing in supportive community. I also love people and organizing things, so I’m excited to help Redwood build up a bank of volunteers ready to pitch in.
Depending on the season and our project schedule, we have opportunities in construction, landscaping and lawn maintenance, cleaning apartments and helping set them up for new residents, helping out in the Furniture Bank warehouse preparing furniture orders or upcycling furniture, and much more. Sometimes we do volunteer days if there is a big project, and we have other volunteers that come on their own once a week to provide support in the United House living room. Let us know what skills you would like to contribute!

We have started using a program called Tandempark to manage our volunteer list. This online tool makes it easier to recruit, manage, schedule, and communicate with a volunteer team – and it’s a Barrie company! You may have heard of them before – they won two Mayor’s Innovation Awards in 2018.

Have a Redwood volunteering story to share? 
If you have volunteered with us in the past, we’d love to hear your stories. We may be able to use it to encourage others to volunteer, too! Sharing stories with Redwood is easy now through our “Tell Us Your Story” collection form. 

Ready to start volunteering? 
It’s easy-peasy. Simply fill out our volunteer form on the Connect page to get started. Those come directly to me and I’ll follow up with you shortly after. 

If you have questions, you can also email me at [email protected]. 

I’m looking forward to working with you, other volunteers, and Redwood’s staff to build Hope Through Housing. 

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