February 27, 2008
WE SERVE: Governor Schwarzenegger Announces First-In-The-Nation Cabinet Position for Service and Volunteering
New York Times: California Creates Cabinet Post To Manage Volunteers
Jennifer Steinhauer
California is a state with frequent natural disasters and vast numbers of people who want to help. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says a recent oil spill in San Francisco Bay helped demonstrate that “volunteerism can be moved a notch.”
To that end, Mr. Schwarzenegger is creating a cabinet-level office for volunteer management, which his administration says is the first such state cabinet position in the country. He is scheduled to announce the move on Tuesday in Los Angeles.
Under the change, the governor’s commission for volunteerism, California Volunteers, will maintain its staffing and budget. But its executive director will gain expanded duties as a cabinet secretary, playing a role in disaster-related planning and response efforts and coordinating volunteers at disaster sites.
The office will also manage donations that flow into the state for disaster relief, a responsibility now held by the state’s Office of Emergency Response. It is the first time a governor’s commission overseeing federal money to manage volunteers — panels required by law since 1993 — has been elevated to a cabinet role.
In a telephone interview, Mr. Schwarzenegger said recent disasters had demonstrated that volunteers were “many times unable to do the kind of work they want to for the state because we are not as organized as we can be.”
He said his wife, Maria Shriver, who is the honorary chairwoman of California Volunteers, helped make the case for giving the office greater prominence and responsibility.
“I have a father-in-law and mother-in-law who have relied on volunteers their whole life,” Mr. Schwarzenegger said, referring to R. Sargent Shriver, the first director of the Peace Corps, and Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the founder of the Special Olympics. “It is something I am very familiar with.”
California, like many states, relies on volunteers in natural disasters and other emergencies. The state, always on earthquake watch, is also prone to wildfires and mudslides. Last fall, over 10,000 residents registered to volunteer in San Diego during the wildfires, and $23 million in private donations poured into the state.
But when 2,000 people showed up to help after the San Francisco oil spill, “they had good intentions but didn’t know what to do with them,” said Karen Baker, the head of California Volunteers, who will become the new secretary for service and volunteering.
The various California agency heads, Ms. Baker said, “didn’t have a fellow cabinet member to talk to them, and so the governor finally called me and said, ‘Get down here with me.’ It was chaos. There were monks who got arrested.”
The state is also facing a budget crisis, with a deficit of billions of dollars. Part of the role of the elevated office will be to drum up more private and corporate money for volunteerism efforts.
“We have no illusions of this being a substitute for government,” said Daniel Zingale, Ms. Shriver’s chief of staff and a senior adviser to the governor. “But we do believe there is a role for citizen engagement during tough budget times.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/26/us/26calif.html?sq=&pagewanted=print
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Time: Schwarzenegger's Radical Volunteering
Amanda Ripley
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger did something radical on Feb. 26, 2008. He announced that he would create a cabinet-level post to manage California volunteers — elevating the head of his volunteerism commission to a prominent executive role in disaster planning and response.
Why is this radical? Because even though regular people do the majority of rescuing after almost every major disaster, they are the last people to be intelligently enrolled in the process. Emergency managers and professional responders do not trust the public as much as they should, nor do politicians. "The first responder community — fire and police — would like you to believe that, without them, you're not going to survive," says Eric Holdeman, who spent 11 years running emergency management operations in Seattle before leaving in 2007. "But the reality is that there are not enough of them to be able to respond to regional, large incidents."
California has learned the painful way. "Government can't do it alone, and that's why I think the governor's smart to elevate it — to say, this matters. Citizens have to be at the table," says Karen Baker, the head of California Volunteers, who is now the secretary for service and volunteering — the name of the governor's radical new post. "Everything I'm saying is obvious. That's why it's brilliant."
The talk of a revolution began during the wildfires that swept through Southern California in October 2007, destroying half a million acres of land. There, Schwarzenegger saw that he had a force multiplier in the legions of regular people who showed up to help. "He got to see at one of the shelters this incredible volunteer who was literally getting 100 senior citizens care on his own," Baker says. "He was on his phone, trying to find hospitals — there were seniors who were going to die because they couldn't get dialysis. The governor was blown away by this."
Then in November of 2007, Schwarzenegger found himself on the scene of another catastrophe, as California governors are wont to do. An oil spill in San Francisco Bay leaked 58,000 gallons of black oil into the water, killing at least 400 birds. Without being asked, thousands of locals showed up to help. Fishermen emptied out their boats and put on their gloves; families came with buckets and Kitty Litter spades. "Two thousand people showed up and said, we'll do hazardous waste removal," says Baker. But most of them were chased away. "All these federal and state agencies said, oh no, we don't need volunteers." Buddhist monks were arrested crossing police lines to help clean up the beach. (Click here for video of subversive citizen beach-cleaning.)
That's about the time when Schwarzenegger called Baker and told her to get up there. "He was there," she says. "He could see that we had this problem of what we call guerrilla volunteers. He said, Karen I need you to get down to Treasure Island, which is where incident command center was."
When she got there, Baker had a two hour meeting with Schwarzenegger, which is, for the governor, exceptionally long. Then she started investigating the problems. She found a regulation requiring 24 hours of training for anyone doing hazardous waste material — which was a major barrier for volunteers. She got it down to four hours, and about 2,000 people got the shorter training. About 1,000 were deployed, and the rest will be ready to go next time.
Schwarzenegger plans to create a disaster corps of volunteers. Already, Baker has been getting calls from other agencies about how they can mobilize volunteers. "He's going to see that this resonates with the people, just like the green issues did." It helps that his wife, Maria Shriver, is the honorary chair of California Volunteers and a longtime champion of public service. Already, other states are paying attention. "I think it's a brilliant move. California is going to be in a great position to benefit," says Wendy Spender, CEO of Volunteer Florida. "We'll all be watching with interest."
http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1717404,00.html
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Los Angeles Times: Governor Gives Volunteerism A Boost To Cabinet Rank
Volunteerism Agency Will Deploy Resources To Natural Disasters.
Amanda Covarrubias
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced a cabinet-level office for volunteer service Tuesday that aims to raise the profile of volunteerism and emergency relief in a state beset by wildfires, earthquakes and other natural disasters.
Schwarzenegger named Karen Baker, executive director of the governor's commission for volunteerism, as secretary of service and volunteering, the first such state cabinet position in the country, he said.
Speaking in a crowded hall at Cal State Northridge, he said he hoped the change would inspire other states to establish similar offices around the country. He gave his wife, Maria Shriver, credit for pushing the idea to give the commission, called California Volunteers, greater prominence and responsibility. Shriver is honorary chairwoman of California Volunteers. "We should have volunteers in every California county," Schwarzenegger said. "We need to harness the great energy that we have out there, all those volunteers who give their time and resources."
Schwarzenegger said he was inspired by the work of his father-in-law, Sargent Shriver, who was the first director of the Peace Corps, and his mother-in-law, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, founder of the Special Olympics. He called the couple "great public servants."
Schwarzenegger called on the audience to "help me create a California of the heart" and said he saw the power of volunteerism firsthand last fall, when wildfire victims gathered at San Diego's Qualcomm Stadium to accept food and shelter from nearly 10,000 volunteers.
Baker said she saw the same sort of public response during a recent oil spill in the Bay Area when 2,000 people stepped forward to help in the cleanup. But most had to be turned away because they weren't specially trained, she said.
"When the incident occurred, we didn't know how to utilize them," she said. "We never had people say they want to do hazardous waste removal. We want to get ahead of this and have volunteers trained, ID'd and credentialed. Get them organized."
Baker will continue to maintain her staff and budget for California Volunteers but will now play a role in disaster planning and response, coordinating volunteers at disaster sites and establishing training programs for those who register at www.californiavolunteers.org.
The office will also manage donations to the state for disaster relief, a responsibility now held by the state's Office of Emergency Response.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-arnold27feb27,1,2351664,print.story
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San Francisco Chronicle: New state Cabinet post devoted to volunteers
Demian Bulwa, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger cited last year's San Francisco Bay oil spill and the ensuing gush of unused volunteers as he signed an executive order Tuesday making California the first state with a Cabinet-level office devoted to organizing volunteers.
Schwarzenegger created a secretary of service and volunteering during a combination news conference and pep rally at Cal State Northridge, where a brass band played and volunteers held signs reading, "We serve."
The position will be filled by Karen Baker, 46, of Sacramento, who will continue to direct the state's California Volunteers program as she has since 2005.
The program is devoted to boosting volunteerism and advises the governor on supporting nonprofits. However, Baker will now take on more responsibility for disaster response. In addition, California Volunteers will manage donations that come in for disaster relief, taking over that job from the Office of Emergency Services.
Baker, a Democrat, volunteered to keep her current $130,000 salary even though compensation for the new Cabinet post is set at $175,000, the governor's office said. The California Volunteers budget will not change.
"I want to move civic engagement to the highest level of our state government, where it belongs," Schwarzenegger said. "All we have to do now is harness this great energy that is out there."
Schwarzenegger said the idea for a Cabinet-level position had come from his wife, Maria Shriver, whose parents are Special Olympics founder Eunice Kennedy Shriver and Peace Corps founding Director Sargent Shriver.
Schwarzenegger's office said a better coordinated volunteer force is needed to assist authorities in responding to earthquakes, floods and other disasters.
After the Cosco Busan container ship struck the Bay Bridge in November and spilled 53,000 gallons of oil, authorities were surprised by the number of volunteers who came forward to clean beaches and birds. Many were turned away because they lacked hazardous materials training, but no training was available for several days, and there was no effective plan in place to deal with them.
"I remember Karen (Baker) coming to me and saying that (agencies involved in the spill response) don't know what to do with all of these thousands of people," Schwarzenegger said.
In an interview after Tuesday's announcement, Baker said her staff had not been brought in to help deal with the spill volunteers for several days. She said the disaster "transformed the governor."
Baker said she plans to use her new position to encourage more cities and counties to coordinate volunteers with one-stop programs like the nonprofit Volunteer Center in San Francisco. She also pointed to state parks' effort to enlist volunteers as a model.
In a disaster, "our role will be to serve as the control tower," Baker said, "to make sure all volunteers - both trained and what we call spontaneous - are well-coordinated."
A study by the Corporation for National and Community Service in 2006 found that 23.7 percent of Californians volunteered that year - a 3 percent drop from 2005 and the first decline since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
How to volunteer
For more information about California Volunteers, or to find a volunteer opportunity:
californiavolunteers.org
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/02/27/BA2QV926L.DTL&type=printable
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Sacramento Bee: Governor sees Cabinet post as way to tap the volunteer spirit
By Andy Furillo
Published 12:00 am PST Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Struck by citizens' response to last year's disasters, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger took action Tuesday to make it easier for California to harness what he sees as the state's growing impulse to volunteer.
In signing an executive order creating a new Cabinet-level secretary's position over service and volunteering, Schwarzenegger said the idea is to encourage people to step up for the big stuff, such as the San Diego fires and the San Francisco Bay oil spill, or maybe just help neighbor kids do their homework.
"By elevating the state's volunteer profile, we will make it easier for people to go and get involved with this whole thing," Schwarzenegger told a raucous crowd at California State University, Northridge.
Schwarzenegger said he first started thinking about the Cabinet post as a serious idea in October, after watching volunteers at Qualcomm Stadium, in San Diego, during the fires. Some of them didn't know if their own homes had escaped the inferno, but they still handed out water and blankets and food.
"I'll never forget that sight," Schwarzenegger said.
The same scenario played out again in November, after a container ship sideswiped the Bay Bridge and blackened the water with thousands of gallons of oil. Regular folks pulled greasy ducks out of the ocean and worked to rake their beaches clean of the gathering black gobs.
"We've never experienced anything like this before," Schwarzenegger said, "this kind of enthusiasm to volunteer."
Schwarzenegger named the executive director of his already-existing volunteers agency, Karen Baker, as secretary over the new volunteer effort.
The position pays $175,000. Baker is refusing to take any more than her current salary of $130,332.
Baker told the Northridge crowd that more than 6 million Californians already are acting on their volunteer impulse.
"But we need millions more," she said. "Am I right?"
She said in a conference call later that her new job will mostly consist of acting as a "control tower," directing the millions to the places they're needed most.
http://www.sacbee.com/111/v-print/story/742619.html
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AP: Schwarzenegger creates cabinet job for volunteerism
Article Launched: 02/26/2008 03:08:17 PM PST
SACRAMENTO—Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is creating a cabinet-level secretary of service and volunteering, a position he says is the first of its kind in the nation.
The governor hopes the new post will improve coordination among volunteer programs and boost volunteerism statewide.
Schwarzenegger is appointing Karen Baker to the position. Baker, 46, heads CaliforniaVolunteers, a commission that oversees the state's AmeriCorps operation and other volunteer groups.
The secretary position would normally come with a salary of $175,000, but Schwarzenegger's office said Baker would decline the raise from her current salary of $130,332 because of the state's budget deficit.
Baker will also coordinate community groups to build a unified disaster volunteer force.
The governor's office said nearly a quarter of California teens and adults are volunteers.
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_8369374
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KCBS: Schwarzenegger Adds Disaster Relief Manager to Cabinet
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) -- To avoid chaotic situations such as when thousands of volunteers came forward after the Cosco Busan oil spill eager to help with the clean-up, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has created a cabinet-level post to help state agencies manage all those helping hands.
The head of the governor’s commission on volunteerism, Karen Baker, will now manage disaster relief donations as a cabinet secretary and her office will act as a point person between agencies and interested volunteers during times of trouble.
Many of the 2,000 thousand worried volunteers who showed up along San Francisco Bay and the coast after the Cosco Busan oil spill to help clean beaches and collect birds were initially turned away. Those in charge said they were surprised by the response and didn't know how to handle the crowds.
Last fall over 10 thousand people volunteered to help during the San Diego wildfires and some $23 million dollars in private relief donations poured in from all over the state.
http://www.kcbs.com/pages/1720711.php
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KMPH 26: Governor Boosts Volunteerism
Posted:
Feb 26, 2008 10:29 PM PST
By: Clint Olivier & Charlene Lee
On Tuesday Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger added a cabinet post to his panel of state department heads - Secretary of Service and Volunteering.
"I just can't think of anything more exciting than the governor of your state recognizing the importance of volunteerism," Cathy Caples said.
Caples is the executive director of the Volunteer Center of Fresno County.
The non-profit helps link up prospective volunteers with community groups who could use a little extra help.
"There isn't a government agency or a non-profit organization that isn't using volunteers in some way," she said.
In Sanger, Pastor Fred Delano worked with mayor Mike Montelongo to put together the all-volunteer, Community of Caring Task Force.
Delano says volunteer groups, like the task force, are important because first-responders and state workers can't be everywhere at once while tending to victims of disasters.
"We realize that if there's any hope for any small community in today's world, it's because we're all working together. We're making a difference," he said.
Mayor Montelongo agrees and says the governor's move means a lot to the morale of volunteers in California.
"I think it's going to just be a lot better for them to see that the governor is very interested in volunteerism and what the importance is," he said.
The new Secretary of Service and Volunteering will be Karen Baker, who is currently serving as the head of the CaliforniaVolunteers group.
According to the governor's office, taxpayers will foot the bill for Bakers' salary of just over 130 thousand dollars a year.
http://www.kmph.com/global/story.asp?s=7931222&ClientType=Printable
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http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/state&id=5983861
ABC7: Governor Signs Bill to Aid CA Volunteers
By Vic Lee
SACRAMENTO (KGO) -- Governor Schwarzenegger has created a new cabinet position which he hopes will promote volunteerism -- the kind that helped clean up the massive oil spill here in the bay last fall. The Governor calls it the first such state position in the country.
A fire gutted the basement apartment of a house in San Francisco's Sunset district on Tuesday and firefighters called the Red Cross to help find temporary shelter for the resident. That's what retired United Airlines salesman, Michael Lionberger was busy doing. He's a volunteer in the Red Cross' disaster services unit. By midday, he found a place for the resident.
"You're doing that for somebody and so you can sleep at night because you know you made a little bit of difference to one person," says Lionberger.
Volunteers like Lionberger welcome the Governor's action. Schwarzenegger signed an executive order creating the new cabinet level position of Secretary of Service and Volunteering.
"Government cannot do it all. Government can give direction for important things but the real action does come from the people," says Schwarzenegger.
The Governor hopes the new position will make it easier for the state to coordinate local volunteers during natural disasters and emergencies. The news comes in the midst of a major training program by the Red Cross.
"As a matter of fact, we hope to train 20,000 volunteers who can help us when a big catastrophic disaster occurs here," says Harold Brooks, Bay Area Red Cross CEO.
Schwarzenegger says he was inspired by the thousands of volunteers who helped clean up the Cosco Busan oil spill in November. With better state coordination, he hopes to prevent the kind of confusion that occurred early on, when volunteers at Civic Center Auditorium were turned away because they did not have the required training.
Earlier this month, United Way expanded its 211 help line service in the Bay Area. It's a service where trained operators, many of them volunteers, help callers with everything from getting shelter food to job training.
United Way's Michael Lynch says the Governor's action is a win for the non profits.
"Last year, nearly 90 percent of our non-profits that we touch base with relied on volunteers to do their work," says Lynch.
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San Diego Union-Tribune: Elevating The Role Of Volunteerism
Karen Baker
Californians want to help. We want to give our time, and we want to volunteer. And we have demonstrated this strong desire time and again, most notably during times of disaster. This past October, when wildfires raged throughout Southern California, more than 10,000 volunteers registered to help. Last month, when oil spilled into San Francisco Bay, thousands more Californians sought out emergency certification to help clean beaches and aid injured wildlife.
Those numbers are impressive, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger personally witnessed the impact of these volunteers. He understands our need to harness this powerful resource.
Schwarzenegger has always believed that our state's greatest resource is the people who call California home. When faced with seemingly insurmountable challenges – whether it's taking care of evacuees during a wildfire or cleaning beaches after an oil spill – volunteers from all backgrounds have stepped forward to answer the call to serve their communities.
Recognizing that government cannot solve all of the state's challenges without actively engaging the people, Schwarzenegger is today announcing that his cabinet will include a secretary on service and volunteering – a first-of-its-kind position in any state. This action provides Californians who give their time and talents to strengthen their communities a seat at the highest levels of state government.
In this capacity, CaliforniaVolunteers will work to enhance and expand volunteer programs throughout our state with the ultimate goal of increasing the number of Californians who volunteer and the impact of their service. The governor has directed me to, additionally, coordinate with the state's community-based disaster volunteer organizations, each of whom play an important role, but together can build a strong disaster volunteer force.
One of the most significant challenges the nonprofit and volunteer sectors face is that many people don't know how to find opportunities that match their interests and availability. The face of California has changed dramatically over the past few decades and many volunteer organizations and nonprofits have struggled to adapt.
Given this new role, CaliforniaVolunteers will work with nonprofits throughout the state to bridge the gap between Californians who want to volunteer and those who actually serve. This will require recognizing our diversity, the varied amounts of time Californians have available to give and the desire we have to make a difference in our own unique ways. We have already taken steps to make volunteering more accessible, by launching the largest statewide online matching network in the country on CaliforniaVolunteers.org. There, you can log on and view volunteer opportunities tailored to your interests, even if you are sitting at home in your pajamas.
The business community also is recognizing the value of community service. There is a growing understanding of the relationship between a strong corporate responsibility program and a company's bottom line. Once simply viewed as a marketing tool, civic engagement is shown to improve worker retention and fosters greater employment satisfaction. I am committed to building greater partnerships with the business sector to establish or expand corporate responsibility programs, both toward engaging individuals in service and using lessons learned by successful businesses to strengthen community nonprofits.
Volunteering also has a measurable positive impact on the economy. That makes this move even more crucial during this challenging time of economic slowdown. In 2006, for example, 6.47 million Californians over the age of 16 engaged in volunteer activities. These volunteers contributed more than 800 million hours of service to the California economy. Their service is valued at more than $17.4 billion. If we increased the percentage of Californians who volunteered by just 1 percent, it would mean 365,000 new volunteers contributing 48 million hours – equating to nearly $1 billion in service to the state. This alone cannot address our state's budget problems, but can play an important role in the solution.
It's also important to note that this move to elevate volunteering will not cost the state an additional cent. Instead, we aim for this department to be an economic benefit to the state.
We have challenging work ahead of us to build a nation-leading corps of volunteers for our state, but I am excited to take on this new role and am confident that, as always, Californians will rise to the challenges we face.
Baker has been executive director of CaliforniaVolunteers since January 2006, and with Gov. Schwarzenegger's announcement later today, will now serve California as its first secretary on service and volunteering.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20080226/news_lz1e26baker.html
