InsidEPR

Saving the Bay, One Plant at a Time

By Leslie Schmidt

It’s volunteer time here at Engage PR! Each time we volunteer, we choose a new way to support the county of Alameda and the surrounding areas. This year we decided to save the bay. Okay, maybe not the whole bay but we definitely did our part. Through the “Save the Bay” organization and their community-based programs, we were able to participate in their ongoing wetland restoration project. Our volunteer activities included plant propagation and transplanting, fertilizing and other maintenance associated with growing native wetland plants.

So as you can imagine, we got a little dirty.

These plants that we spent so much quality time with (which we were told amounted to around 1,100 plants!) will eventually be planted around the edges of the bay later this year – most likely by other awesome volunteers. And even though we won’t know exactly which plants we helped come back to life, we know that our efforts will help save our bay – even if by just a little.

As it turns out, this year is “Save the Bay’s” 50th anniversary! Fifty years of fighting to keep our bay beautiful is definitely something to celebrate. Finding this out made the entire experience a million times better! Our Save the Bay guide for the day, Dylan, gave us a crash course of the history of the bay and the organization’s last 50 years.

So here is your crash course, from me to you: “Save the Bay” was founded in 1961 as “Save San Francisco Bay Association” by three East Bay women who were watching the Bay vanish before their eyes. The organization was focused on stopping the city of Berkeley’s plan to extend their city into the shallow Bay off-shore. Thousands of people from the East Bay and surrounding areas came together to stop the project and as a result, numerous projects similar to “Save the Bay” sprung up throughout the region. Since then, “Save the Bay” has easily become the largest regional organization working to protect, restore and celebrate this great natural treasure.

Please enjoy the beautiful pictures of the bay accompanied by pictures of dirt piled high in this fun slideshow!

EPR volunteers with MedShare

By Molly Reynolds

Children in Africa die from the absence of clean breathing tubes. In the jungles of South America, skin sliced by rocks may become septic for want of sutures. Back in mid-December, EPR spent an afternoon sorting through some of the two million pounds of unused medical supplies that the United States wastes each year. Terry and Tierney showed us the ropes at MedShare, guiding us through the several stages of categorization and quality control that allow the nonprofit to donate unused but viable medical supplies to more than 80 countries.

MedShare has shipped more than 600 forty-foot containers to indigent international communities. It has saved in excess of one million cubic feet from area landfills and provided medical supplies for over 1,500 medical mission teams. For more information, I encourage you to visit MedShare’s website. EPR had a truly satisfying experience while packing 42 boxes of lifesaving instruments and equipment.

Please check out the slideshow below for highlights of the day.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

 

Help Us Help You

By Molly Reynolds

The group was stuck in a community service rut – a good kind of rut, but a rut nonetheless. The team at  Engage PR had been volunteering with the same two organizations over and over because they were local and accepted a group of our size. I was determined to expand our horizons, make a positive mark on the community -in short, change lives!

It was not so easy.

To start, an environmental group that EPR had worked previously has added a stipulation to its volunteering requirements. Folks must show up in groups of at least 15 and pay a “suggested fee” of nearly a $1000 to work for them for half a day. That’s when I knew it would be tricky. Pay to volunteer?

The second organization, which matches individuals and groups with volunteer opportunities, held more promise. No up-front cost here. At least, until I spoke with the representative, who indicated a fee of $1,500 for us, since we were a corporate group.

A third organization, a very well-known International organization, requested 25 volunteers and $2,500.

Please, help us help you. At the risk of sounding stingy or lazy, I couldn’t help thinking that many  people  who may be inclined to volunteer would be stopped by these roadblocks. Isn’t it in the interest of nonprofit organizations to eliminate any obstacles to potential volunteers? This doesn’t seem to be the case.

Then, through a lengthy Yelp! search, I found them. The members of a national organization to get overstocked medical supplies to needy hospitals and clinics finally accepted us. They wanted no money, just our time and hard work. In December, we will help them with their mission. If things go well, maybe we’ll even help them more than once.

Cabbage and Egg Rolls: All in a Day's Work!

By Cari Goodrich

Eight-hour days can really fly by when you’re busy with client activity, which makes it difficult to take on extra, non-billable work.

As followers of the EPR blog are aware, our company engages in quarterly community service projects. This quarter my colleague Chelsea and I were responsible for organizing the Q107 project.

From past experience I knew that time management was going to be the key factor in organizing a successful project. A lot of back-and-forth with organizations occurs before we obtain the “perfect” schedule.  This process can often take weeks, if not months.

We’ve worked with many wonderful organizations in the past and have had very successful outings. We’ve done it all in the name of community service – gardened, cooked, and even exercised!  This time around, Chelsea and I wanted to do something new and refreshing. We wanted everyone who participated in the event to immediately feel the work they were doing was rewarding.

Taking Time for the Community

By Becky Caudill

You know it’s a busy time at Engage PR when the posts on this blog are few and far between.  This month the account team has been go, go, go – product launches, media tours, and tradeshows, to name just a few of the things we’ve got on our plates.  It all adds up and unfortunately, leaves very little time to devote to the blogosphere.  That said, this past week my colleagues and I took time out from our hectic schedules to give back to the community by volunteering our time (and energy!) to the Alameda County Community Food Bank. 

The Alameda County Community Food Bank is a nonprofit organization that has been serving the area since 1985. As the county’s clearinghouse for donated food, the Food Bank provides food assistance for 40,000 low-income Alameda County residents each week, including 14,000 children and 7,000 seniors. Most adults served are among the working poor.

Whether it was sorting and boxing cabbage or egg rolls, we know that the time we spent will better the lives of some of our area’s most hungry, and at the end of the day, that’s time well spent.

EPR Plays Santa Claus

By Julia Ball

I’ve been an employee with Engage PR for a little over three months now, but have been involved with the company for a little over five years. My mom, Cindy Foley, is the director of operations, and I just joined the team as the office manager. I’ve attended several volunteer events that EPR has participated in over the years, but this last event was definitely the most rewarding.

One of our employees, Johnny Truong, coordinated this year’s holiday event at the Perinatal Council in Oakland. We served dinner and played Santa to 17 families who didn’t have much of their own to celebrate the holiday with. Most of the people we met were young mothers with infants and toddlers.