Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome back. I thought a great way to kick off the new year would be to offer you some new opportunities for volunteering across Norfolk County.
No better way to do that than with the Norfolk county rsvp. Program Director Lucille Cassis stopped on by to tell us what's available for you. Happy New Year, Lucille.
[00:00:18] Speaker B: Hi, Joe. Happy 2026.
[00:00:20] Speaker A: Hard to believe, isn't it?
[00:00:21] Speaker B: It is.
[00:00:22] Speaker A: Here we are actually new too. Is you exactly right about how long has it been now at the program?
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Just about a year. I started in February of 25, so, yeah. Coming up on a year, how's it going? Excellent. Really good. Yeah. It's a very rewarding service that we run and people are very enthusiastic. It's very positive. So it's lucky me, you get to.
[00:00:45] Speaker A: See the best of mankind. Right? Folks volunteering their time to do good. Right.
[00:00:50] Speaker B: It's a dream, really. Yeah.
[00:00:51] Speaker A: Good for you.
[00:00:52] Speaker B: Good for you.
[00:00:53] Speaker A: For folks who don't know, we should start out with just a little recap of what RSVP program is.
[00:00:59] Speaker B: Absolutely. So the acronym RSVP is Retired Senior Volunteer Program.
And RSVPs across the country are organized to enable volunteers, people who are 55 or older, to volunteer in their community.
And we operate on a grant partially from AmeriCorps seniors, which is a federally funded grant. And we're sponsored by the county of Norfolk.
Our RSVP has an actual solid history right here in Quincy because it was operated out of QCAP Quincy Community action programs about 20 years ago. And the county took over the program and began running it through our offices in Dedham.
[00:01:53] Speaker A: Oh, okay. So is that unique to Norfolk county rsvp?
[00:01:57] Speaker B: It actually is that a municipality would usually. It's a more of a non profit type thing. And there's several nonprofits that run RSVPs.
Foster Grandparents is another part of that. AmeriCorps Family and Senior Advocates, they call them.
[00:02:18] Speaker A: Last time you were here with County Commissioner Joe Shea, we talked a little bit about how cutbacks at the federal level might impact the rsvp. Have you seen that happen?
[00:02:27] Speaker B: Yes.
So back In April of 25, unfortunately, AmeriCorps as an organization, which is a federal or quasi public organization, they laid off probably 85% of their staff.
And they also run the AmeriCorps program for people under 55. So those are the folks, the young kids that go out and do service, kind of like the Peace Corps stateside.
And they usually go through FEMA and they go out to disaster sites and all of that. And they had. They get stipends and Housing to perform those volunteer activities. So that was pretty devastating.
We're on a three year grant right now and we're funded through April of this year.
I'm not sure what's going to happen, which is unfortunate.
But we've also applied to the Mass. Department of Transportation for our Rides for Vet Service. So we're looking for different ways to maybe restructure the program if we are not able to get additional funding. But we're keeping our fingers crossed and hopefully the government will at least partially fund the grant for the next three years.
[00:03:47] Speaker A: So, major challenge for you, Lucille, in your first year.
[00:03:51] Speaker B: It was. It was kind of a surprise.
[00:03:52] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:03:54] Speaker B: But what can you do? I've worked in government before, so we're used to rolling with the punches. And it's such a. We're so committed to it. County Commissioner Joe Shea and Peter Collins from Milton and Richard Stady from Canton, the three commissioners are very committed to this program. So I feel fortunate that I have the muscle behind, right behind it. And, you know, it's just a wonderful service. And we provide. Last year we provided 16,000 hours of service to various nonprofits and different roles.
And our Rides for Vets program, we do almost 1,000 rides a year.
So we really feel a need and it would be a shame, obviously, if it had to go away, but I feel pretty confident that we're going to hang on.
[00:04:45] Speaker A: Good.
We'll have you back after April and see how things are going.
[00:04:49] Speaker B: Oh, thanks. Yeah, that would be.
[00:04:51] Speaker A: But the county commissioners control the purse string, so they're looking, I'm sure, very diligently to find funding to keep things going.
[00:04:57] Speaker B: They are. They're very good about that. Excellent. So we're very fortunate.
[00:05:01] Speaker A: So what is available in 2026 for volunteer opportunities? Lucille?
[00:05:05] Speaker B: Oh, gosh.
Runs the GAM.
So I think our flagship program is probably our Rides for Vet Service.
[00:05:12] Speaker A: No question.
[00:05:13] Speaker B: Yeah. It's just we really feel a niche in terms of.
It's that sweet spot where, you know, the veteran maybe can't had just recently stopped driving themselves and are unable to do that and maybe their adult children are still working. So when you look at the demographics are, the average age of our riders is probably in the, you know, mid-80s.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: Okay. Wow.
[00:05:40] Speaker B: And their adult children are in their early 60s, late 50s, and they're still working and have a hard time helping out.
So I think, you know, we feel a need that is really important to get people to and from their medical appointments. Most of the rides are to the VA's the West Roxbury Brockton and Jamaica Plain. Occasionally we'll go for the folks that live in the western part of the county, like Bellingham and Plainville. Sometimes they'll utilize the Providence VA, so it's only a 40 minute ride from there. So we have 40 drivers who are absolutely wonderful. Most are veterans themselves, so they have a nice camaraderie with the rider.
[00:06:24] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:06:25] Speaker B: And they just really enjoy taking people to their appointments. And we only ask that you do two rides per month, although a lot of folks do more.
And, you know, you can pick the rides you want. We have an online system where you just go in and look at what's available and pick whatever you want. So there's no, you know, commitment to every, you know, Thursday or something. It's random.
[00:06:53] Speaker A: At your convenience.
[00:06:53] Speaker B: At your convenience. Yeah.
And yeah, we, we did a ton of rides last year. So we're, we're looking to do more and, you know, help those folks that maybe don't qualify for the VA rides. So the va, it's income based when they send the van to pick folks up.
Unfortunately, we can't do a wheelchair.
We can't accommodate a wheelchair because our volunteers are using their own vehicles.
[00:07:21] Speaker A: Right. Yeah.
[00:07:22] Speaker B: You know, so. But that's when they have to send the van or they can use the ride.
Oh, through the table, through the t. Exactly.
However, when you take the ride or the VA van, you're driving around a bit.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: It's not just you.
[00:07:39] Speaker B: Right. It's not just you. There's other people on the bus.
[00:07:41] Speaker A: Not a private ride.
[00:07:42] Speaker B: Right, right. So this, you know, people love it because it's door to door and.
[00:07:45] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:07:46] Speaker B: Yeah. So it's really good.
[00:07:47] Speaker A: Who are your drivers or who can be a driver?
[00:07:50] Speaker B: You know, that's a great question. So obviously you have to have a good driving record. Of course, we cory check everyone and you have to have a sturdy vehicle. You have to have a working vehicle. And we check all that in the interview process.
Then I think about the average age of a driver is in the early 70s and they've retired, but they're still looking to give back.
And like I said, they're veterans themselves. And although we have many women that drive. Yep. And most of the veterans are male, but we have some female drivers as well.
[00:08:31] Speaker A: More and more women veterans too.
[00:08:33] Speaker B: Yes, exactly. As the generations.
But in that demographic, it is more male riders and male drivers. But they just do a wonderful job and they're so selfless and, you know, they'll call me and say, you know, I really want to take this guy Again, because he's such a nice guy. So, yeah, there's relationships there where I'll try to match up people that they want to drive, but they do a wonderful job, and they'll help them to the door and back. But most of the folks have to be ambulatory. They can have a walker or a cane, which is fine, and they can go in and out on their own. Although if you have a procedure like an endoscopy, say, or colonoscopy, we will go in and sign you out because that's required.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: They won't release the patient.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: Yeah. And they won't release you to a cab. So really, those are really important routes, rides for the person.
[00:09:27] Speaker A: Okay, good to know as well. Absolutely.
Is there a limit on the number of rides that somebody can give?
[00:09:35] Speaker B: Not really.
We reimburse for mileage up to 300 miles a month, so I guess that's the limit. But we do 40 cents a mile reimbursement, and we do occasional gas cards when our budget permits.
We might do that a couple of times a year, usually around Christmas time. We do it just as an extra incentive for folks who are, you know, giving of their time and treasure. And, you know, they're putting wear and tear in their vehicle, too. So we try to do that, and the drivers love it. And we do a nice luncheon every summer. Very popular, get everybody together. And, you know, we give out awards for people who have driven the most miles and whatnot. So.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: Speaking of, you put together a really neat bar chart.
[00:10:22] Speaker B: I did that.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: We want to show folks to give an idea of where these drivers are coming from. Look at that.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: Yeah. I was curious.
[00:10:30] Speaker A: Quincy beats them all.
[00:10:31] Speaker B: Quincy's about 20%. Quincy, Weymouth, Dedham area. About 20 to 30% of our riders come from there.
[00:10:39] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:10:40] Speaker B: And I was actually surprised to see that as well, because I was thinking it was more the middle part of the county, but lots of folks coming from Quincy, and yet I don't have a lot of drivers from Quincy, so. But there's folks from the middle of the county who are willing to drive and just go right through and take folks to VA to Jamaica Plain. Exactly.
But this is like a month snapshot, so you can see kind of where people are coming from.
And, you know, again, the.
The VA's have that income requirement, so we don't charge anything. Obviously, it's a volunteer service. You know, sometimes our riders want to tip the driver, and, you know, we say we don't want to tip. Yeah, no, no, we don't. Want you. We don't want that. We're doing this as a service, so. And it's part of the grant, so.
[00:11:30] Speaker A: Yeah. What a great way too, for veterans to give back, you know.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:11:34] Speaker A: To either. Either folks they may know through the military or get to know.
[00:11:39] Speaker B: Absolutely. And we work very closely with the Councils on Aging, so the Kennedy center, the senior centers in the county refer people to us when they. They also do rides. But most of the senior centers do just local like supermarket and whatnot.
They. They don't usually do outside of the town that they're representing. Right.
[00:12:00] Speaker A: So it's paid for by that municipality, so.
[00:12:02] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: In their borders. Yeah.
[00:12:05] Speaker B: Right. Right.
[00:12:06] Speaker A: Now, can a driver bring a veteran to a private doctor's appointment?
[00:12:10] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely, yes. Yeah. Private. I would say the. I would say probably 60% of the rides are to the VAs and the other 40% are private appointments throughout the county to their dentist. Doctor.
We have one. We have a couple of folks that, you know, we take them to important errands like pharmacy or.
[00:12:30] Speaker A: I was going to ask.
[00:12:31] Speaker B: They have to pay the cable bill or they want to do it in person or go to the bank.
[00:12:35] Speaker A: A shopping trip, would that be.
[00:12:37] Speaker B: We do occasional shopping trips. Yep. As long as they.
It usually is about an hour and a half limit. Otherwise we split the ride where we have a driver take to and from. So those are shorter shopping trips.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: Gotcha.
[00:12:52] Speaker B: Okay. All right.
[00:12:53] Speaker A: But I mean, if transportation and mobility are an issue, this is a critical service for these folks.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Absolutely. And with the AmeriCorps grant, their focus is on senior isolation as well as transportation.
So this kind of fits both of those requirements in terms of, you know, that might be the only person that rider sees in that week or two weeks. It could be.
[00:13:18] Speaker A: Which also translates into better mental health as well. You know, I mean, it's absolutely. I don't think you can see the benefits just looking at a bar graph like that. These numbers, there are people behind them.
[00:13:29] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely.
And one great story is this woman who is still working because she's in her late 50s and is a full time caregiver for her dad. And she called me and said, you know, I just couldn't possibly get him to his PT appointments.
He had a fall, basically.
[00:13:46] Speaker A: Two full time jobs essentially.
[00:13:48] Speaker B: Right, right. And she's like, you guys have just saved our life. Because I could never, you know, I'd lose my job if I had to take him.
[00:13:56] Speaker A: So it's helping the entire family.
[00:13:57] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. Which is really nice to hear.
[00:14:00] Speaker A: Absolutely. So that's your main program?
[00:14:03] Speaker B: It is.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: We're always looking for folks to participate.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Absolutely. But we're also in the schools. So we have about a dozen folks that are in the elementary schools throughout Norfolk county, grades Pre K to 5. And they're helping their teachers with reading, the fundamentals, math. Math skills.
And a lot of them are retired teachers who just miss the classroom, which is kind of nice. So they know the drill, they know what to expect. And the teacher loves having them come in because it takes the pressure off if they have 20 some odd students.
[00:14:35] Speaker A: Second teacher. Yeah.
[00:14:37] Speaker B: And they're there once a week, maybe twice a week in some cases. And they absolutely love it. So we have a whole cadre of school based volunteers as well.
[00:14:47] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:14:48] Speaker B: And then we work obviously with all the non profits. We have friendly visitors to nursing homes, long term care facilities, and even to private homes for isolated seniors who can't get out and just looking for someone to talk to.
We also have ESOL. We have a great new program at St. Jerome's Church right in Weymouth where it's called Mai Lee. And it's an adult daycare for Vietnamese speaking, really seniors.
And we have a volunteer who was very experienced in English as a second language esol and she wanted to do something in the schools and we didn't have a placement for her. So she, we matched her up with this. And she's just having a great experience.
Yeah, she used AI, I was telling you earlier, you used AI to come up with a curriculum because she doesn't speak Vietnamese. But she has one of the staffers kind of troubleshoot when she runs into some, you know, obstacles. And he does a great job in helping her out. But the seniors there love it. And she said, you know, they're all at different levels. Some may only went to the third grade or, you know, in their own country, but are just very eager to learn English. And it's such a nice program.
[00:16:13] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:16:13] Speaker B: And she's really spearheaded that in Weymouth.
[00:16:17] Speaker A: Wow, that sounds like one that could be duplicated too.
[00:16:19] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:16:20] Speaker A: Parts of the county. Yeah.
[00:16:21] Speaker B: Yeah. Especially where she's developed the curriculum. I think we absolutely could do that in other places.
[00:16:26] Speaker A: That's exciting.
[00:16:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: Well, AI is just infiltrating all aspects of our lives.
[00:16:31] Speaker B: I confess I have to use it sometimes.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: Meals on Wheels, I know, is another big one.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: Yes, yes. South Shore Elder Services, we have probably another dozen folks driving.
They always need people to do Meals on Wheels. And again, that's like a, you know, a weekly monthly commitment.
You know, it's up to. Up to the person.
And I know that they're always calling me for new folks. And, you know, we. The nice thing about RSVP is we're kind of like a headhunter for volunteers.
[00:17:02] Speaker A: Right. Well, this is kind of a central gathering place, if you will. Right, right.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: And we do all the. The background and the interviews, and we kind of vet the person and then we just hand them over, you know, to the nonprofit. And they love it because that's a whole other step that they don't have to worry about.
[00:17:17] Speaker A: That's right. Yeah.
[00:17:18] Speaker B: Sometimes you have to fill out their paperwork, too. And like, for the schools, you have to do another core. Makes perfect sense, which is understandable.
But they really enjoy working with us. And, you know, our group of volunteers is like their own community. And they, you know, they have the benefit of being able to work with me in terms of any problems that come up with the volunteer role. And I can usually be a liaison between the nonprofit and the person to solve it.
[00:17:50] Speaker A: You do have a contracted position available, right, at rsvp?
[00:17:53] Speaker B: Yes, we do. We do. Our volunteer coordinator retired in October.
And just because of the uncertainty of the funding, we're doing a short term contract position.
And it's very flexible. However many hours the person wants to work a week to help me and to help the program stay on top of all the volunteer requests that come in, we almost can't keep up.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: Kind of a good problem to have.
[00:18:20] Speaker B: Which is a good problem to have. But the whole processing of volunteers and helping us with the ride dispatch and.
[00:18:27] Speaker A: Somebody with good organizational skills. Absolutely.
[00:18:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:31] Speaker A: Reach out to you for that?
[00:18:32] Speaker B: Yes, please. Yes.
[00:18:33] Speaker A: We've been putting up your website.
[00:18:35] Speaker B: Oh, good. My phone number.
[00:18:37] Speaker A: Your phone number. Perfect. It's all out there.
[00:18:39] Speaker B: Excellent. That's good to know.
[00:18:40] Speaker A: So great to talk to you, Lucille.
[00:18:42] Speaker B: Same here, Joe.
[00:18:43] Speaker A: Great to kick off the new year.
[00:18:44] Speaker B: Thanks for the opportunity.
[00:18:45] Speaker A: Oh, please come back.
[00:18:46] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:18:47] Speaker A: We'll have you back.
[00:18:47] Speaker B: It'll be a pleasure. Thank you.
