Community Events

Community Events are the best way to develop new volunteer members to your organization. They provide a platform of fun and community cohesiveness that many times develops into community involvement. If your Citizen Corps organization is having trouble recruiting new volunteers, I would encourage you to make sure your organization has information tables and representatives at all of your local community functions.

This past week (August 3rd - August 9th) I had the opportunity to attend two community events. The first was the National Night Out event in Mt. Vernon, Ohio (Knox County) on Tuesday August 4th. This was the first year for the Mt. Vernon community to host a National Night Out event. I was pleased to see the level involvement from the community organizations, agency and public. The event had free food and a live band playing some oldies from the 1960's and 1970's.

The second event we attended this week was the Russell's Point (Logan County) Neighborhood Watch Community Event. Logan County has a very successful and active Neighborhood Watch program around their communities. The Logan County Citizen Corps program used this event to promote general preparedness for adults and children. Our department was happy to contribute emergency supply kits and survival blankets to the table for distribution. The picture below is of Larry Armstrong, the CERT Coordinator and instructor for Logan County.

Again, if you are aware that your community is having a community event, take the effort to contact the event director to see if you can get an information booth for your Citizen Corps program.