Volunteering

Interested in joining our team of Volunteers? We'd love to have you!

November marks National Family Caregivers Month, a time to recognize the more than 336,000 family caregivers in Utah who help older parents, spouses, and other loved ones live independently at home, where they want to be. The unpaid care they provide through managing medications, cooking meals, driving to appointments, performing complex medicals tasks and more is valued at $4.15 billion in Utah alone.

AARP Utah was pleased to bestow the 2015 Andrus Award for Community Service to Carol Jenson. Carol is a dedicated, tireless volunteer with the Utah Food Bank, delivering food boxes to seniors every week. Though the Food Bank only asks volunteers to deliver to a maximum of three people, Carol serves 21. These people not only anticipate her arrival with food to supplement their diets but the social interaction with the pleasant and caring person who brightens up their lives. One the rare occasions when she is unable to make it, Carol makes sure that food is delivered to the people who depend on it. She spent at least 250 hours at the Food Bank last year and was honored as their Volunteer of the Year in 2014.

Congratulations to AARP Utah's Community Outreach Director Jill Duke, who was honored April 17 as the Utah Food Bank's Board Member of the Year. The remarks by Board Chair Scott Jensen honoring her for this award follow below:

AARP Utah extends its warmest congratulations to Duane Blackwell, AARP’s Driver Safety Program 2014 Utah Volunteer of the Year who was recently selected as the Regional Volunteer of the Year for Western Region 2. He will now compete with seven other regional winners across the country for the Michael Seaton Volunteer of the Year, the highest award bestowed within the Driver Safety Program recognizing its most outstanding volunteer.

by Lee Benson of the Deseret News

Photo by Rick Egan, The Salt Lake Tribune

AARP Outreach Director Jill Duke and Lily Ormsby,

Tax season is never the happiest time of the year, but that's when Utah's dozens of Tax Aide volunteers spring into action to help people complete their tax forms--for free. Tax Aide sites are available at approximately 32 sites in Utah, though the program is nationwide and serves people in every state. There is no age or income limit, but the program primarily serves people over 60 of low-to-moderate incomes. All volunteers are trained and many have accounting or finance backgrounds. Congratulations to State Coordinator Jack Dahl and his many volunteers of the state for serving Utahns well and providing a much needed service.

AARP Utah is a strong supporter of the Utah Food Bank (UFB), with several volunteers who deliver food boxes on a regular basis and a monthly staff service project. So when we donated $8000 to the UFB, our Advocacy Director, Danny Harris, had the idea to challenge our Utah members to match it. We sent letters to each member in the state while the UFB promoted the match challenge on their website, online ads, and through social media. We thought that bringing in an extra $20,000 would exceed any reasonable expectations, so were thrilled that AARP Utah members contributed over $38,000 in checks and online donations. Because the UFB can translate each dollar donated into eight dollars of goods and services, AARP Utah’s total contribution has a value of $373,448! Both the UFB and we were amazed by the enormous generosity of our members in Utah.