Houston Ground Angels
Management Review
January 2019
Tony Castiglie, Vice President & Treasurer
The Christmas Season has come to an end and a new year begins. I hope everyone had an enjoyable holiday and 2019 brings continued joy and happiness. For Houston Ground Angels, the Christmas Season began with the Appreciation Gathering of the Volunteers, this year held at Cullen Oaks. The venue turned out to be ideal and the catering and food was excellent. At one time, the volunteers really did not know each other but over the years, we have had several gatherings and people now know each other. The comradery was nice to see, and it made for an enjoyable evening. A number of volunteers were unable to attend, stating that they no longer feel comfortable driving at night. In all likelihood, we will have our 2019 gathering ending at 6:30 P.M rather than beginning then.
And now for the final 2018 tally! 79 volunteers ran 2,603 Missions, hitting our target of 2,600. Unfortunately, we were unable to fulfill almost 600 requests for missions. We simply do not have enough volunteers to satisfy all the requests we receive. New volunteers are hard to come by; many non-profits seek the same folks we do. We are trying to make an arrangement with Uber and probably will do so. That is less than ideal since Uber drivers will not provide the personal interaction and comfort that our volunteers do. But at least the patients will have a ride.
We are thankful for our Archangels, the volunteers who run so many missions. Who are they:
Top 10 Volunteers – 2018
1.
Sandra Begalke
395
2.
Dick Stabell
348
3.
Charles Whitworth 345
4.
Tony LaRosa
151
5.
David LaFargue
150
6.
Charles Gibson
118
7.
Laurie Galland
86
8.
Derek King
81
9.
Bo Hunter
77
10.
Maria Aranovich
64
Please take note of the Top three. Sandra, Dick and Charles each ran over 345 Missions. That’s about one per day for a whole year! How fortunate are we to have folks like that? While we appreciate what any volunteer does, these Archangels are very special to go above and beyond.
December brought us one new volunteer: Christy Jennings, daughter of volunteer Barbara Oxsheer and father Jacko Garrett, and she lives in the Memorial area. Barbara and Jacko attend many of our events, and so many of you may have met them. It is great having you aboard Christy and thank you for choosing to be part of our great organization.
As always, to every volunteer who steps up, thank you for your contribution. 2018 was another good year and hopefully, 2019 will be even better.
Happy New Year to all,
Tony
