The work continues: it just looks different this year. We talked to Patrick Gleason, the VA Voluntary Service Chief at the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center in Chicago, to see what supporting veterans looks like in the era of COVID-19.
At right, Gleason poses with Elks Scholar Fellow Sancy Childers, at the 2018 Elks Scholar Leadership Weekend.
We started with a callback to mid-March, when his office had to quickly shut down the volunteer program and find a way to serve veterans without all the volunteers they’d come to depend on. For the staff and the volunteers, this was not easy. In fact, Gleason said the number one word for it was “emotional.”
He recalls, “We had to inform all our volunteers by mail, by email and by phone, unfortunately telling these folks that they would not be able to come in until further notice. It was very sensitive, and it was very sad because a number of them have been coming in regularly for quite for a long time. This is a huge part of their lives.”
It wasn’t just hard for the volunteers. The VA staff greatly missed the extra help and the chance to spend time with the volunteers they’d come to depend on and to call friends. There was also the burden on employees having to pick up the work that was normally done by these volunteers, which was no small feat.
“I’ve never worked so hard to have fewer volunteers,” jokes Gleason, whose job in normal times involves rallying as much community support and as many volunteers as possible.
Even during a pandemic, especially during a pandemic, veterans need support. Gleason says right now, the most urgent needs that volunteers can fill are helping with simple, physical things.
Gleason elaborates, “We want all our volunteers to be fully aware of the risks that they’re taking. We don’t want to decide for them who can and who can’t volunteer. We want to be very transparent. And all volunteers sign a commitment that they’ll adhere to all the requirements.”
One silver lining is a renewed awareness of the importance of their work. “We had people that called every day to see if they could come back. Every day, we’d say, you have to trust us, we’ll let you know. We really learned the value of what providing volunteer opportunities means for many people.”
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