As Florida moves toward the peak of hurricane season, the American Red Cross has stepped up its year-long drive to recruit and train volunteers to staff shelters.
As part of these efforts, Red Cross team members from across South Florida came together earlier this month in July for a shelter simulation exercise to put their training to the test.
As Red Cross leadership explained at the event, working in a shelter can be as rewarding as it is demanding. The lead time to open a shelter can range from hours to days, and there is lots to do before the shelter doors can be opened to serve the public. As a result, staff learned how to perform various tasks, including resident registration, setting up a cot, and providing food to large numbers of people, all under different scenarios.
But ultimately, what the Red Cross needs more than people who know the intricacies of serving dinner to 200 people or the spacing of 150 cots that turn a school gym into a dormitory—which are all important--are volunteers with compassion, says Ryan Logan, Regional Disaster Officer for the South Florida Red Cross. “I want people that can treat someone with care and compassion. That’s 90% of what we’re doing in a shelter.”
“Working in a shelter is very much centered on the people we serve,” he added. “We need to make sure we can support more people and their needs. All our volunteers need flexibility and problem-solving skills. We may train to the ideal, but conditions are not always ideal. We need to make sure [volunteers] can adapt.”
In the event of a major evacuation across South Florida, the Red Cross needs volunteers to staff up to 37 shelters across the 13-county region. And considering staffing needs and fluid volunteer availability, Logan explains the process of bringing on new team members as a continuous effort.
“We need to be recruiting constantly to make sure we can meet the needs of our community,” Logan said. “Just because we have a large number of people who say they want to volunteer doesn’t mean they’re going to be available the next day.”
The American Red Cross has been operating post-disaster shelters almost as long as it’s been in existence. Five months after the organization was founded on May 21, 1881, it organized its first disaster relief effort, helping victims of Michigan forest fires. Among the large-scale events the Red Cross responded to soon after that were the Johnstown, Pennsylvania floods of 1889 and the Sea Islands Hurricane of 1893, which left more than 30,000 residents of South Carolina homeless.
Since then, its role has continued, and grown steadily. In 2021 alone, the Red Cross provided more than 204,600 overnight shelter and emergency hotel stays nationwide to help families devastated by disasters.
The care that the Red Cross provides has evolved as well, Logan said. “For us as an organization, we have adapted to better meet the needs of those we serve, with a particular eye on special needs.”
With that history in mind, the ever-growing need for trained volunteers, and the increasing complexity of operating a shelter, the South Florida Region of the Red Cross ran a comprehensive training event in English and Spanish for 71 volunteers in mid-July, simulating the opening of a 200-person shelter.
One of the key points that volunteers learned is the difference between an evacuation shelter and a post-storm shelter.
Evacuation shelters are set up before a storm so people can stay there while winds and flooding are at their peak. They are run by county government and are open for only a short time. The Red Cross contributes some, but not all, of the staffing and doesn’t manage these facilities.
Post-storm shelters are for people whose homes were damaged or destroyed or are inaccessible. In many instances, they are managed by the Red Cross and can remain open for days, weeks and sometimes months as community partners and the Red Cross help residents with recovery, including support in finding more sustainable housing. Most of the recent day-long training session earlier this month was keyed to post-storm shelters.
Some of the work assigned to volunteers requires following set training guidelines: like getting tables in place in registration areas and cots in place in the dormitory; posting signs that direct people to the shelter, to the dorm area, the dining area; unloading food, water and other supplies from trucks; keeping a table stocked with snacks and bottled water; helping people line up for meals supplied by vendors; and handing out necessities like blankets and toiletry supplies.
Other work requires quick judgment calls, like when a child shows up unaccompanied by a parent or guardian; when someone with special needs – emotional or physical – signs in; when someone has a special dietary request; or when residents show up with family pets. Sometimes the volunteer just has to know when to alert the shelter manager. Other times, volunteers need to know the details of policies and procedures, supplemented by a strong dose of common sense and compassion.
While initial training to work in a shelter is available online through EDGE, a Red Cross training platform, organizing shelter simulation drills like this help demonstrate some of the unique situations volunteers could face under the heightened conditions brought on by a disaster.
Emotionally speaking, the people staying in a shelter may be traumatized by damage to their homes and other loss and anxiety they may experience, like being separated from their family or a pet. While the Red Cross has a team of trained and specialized professionals who are deployed to provide one-on-one mental health services in a shelter, other volunteers can help reduce the stress level just by being there or listening, said Tom Nahrstedt, a licensed mental health counselor in private practice from Marathon who works with the Red Cross.
“I want Red Cross volunteers walking around, talking to residents and looking for folks that might be distressed. Just a little bit of therapeutic care,” he said. “When you see volunteers walking around talking to people,” he added, “you see the stress level go down. Just their presence is helpful. When clients see you in your Red Cross clothes, they know you’re there to help. People just open up; they really respond to Red Cross volunteers.”
In addition to care provided to individuals displaced by disasters, according to Ryan Logan, the South Florida Regional Disaster Officer, volunteers also realize that the experience can have an impact on their own lives as well, that they have also received something from the people around them.
Nahrstedt agreed. “Volunteering is an incredible experience,” he said. “You always get more than you give.”
Sign up to become a shelter volunteer this hurricane season by visiting redcross.org/SFLvolunteer.
Written by Marjie Lambert, American Red Cross Public Affairs