Disaster Recovery

The Role of JustServe in Disaster Recovery

During a disaster or an emergency, the role of JustServe remains the same—to connect volunteers to organizations with service opportunities. In a crisis, many nonprofit organizations have greater needs, which vary from frontline to back-end support. JustServe is available to these organizations so they can share their volunteer needs with the community.

JustServe simplifies the volunteer process for organizations that receive many calls from people who want to help. Rather than trying to manage this process alone, organizations instead refer volunteers to sign up on JustServe.org. This allows organizations and individuals alike to focus their efforts more fully on disaster recovery.

JustServe Specialists

The roles and responsibilities of JustServe specialists include the following:

JustServe specialists are positioned as a resource to support community organizations and their unaffiliated volunteers and as such do not make commitments or decisions on behalf of the Church or Latter-day Saint Charities.
JustServe specialists work under priesthood direction. However, JustServe and JustServe.org should not be used to support priesthood-led assignments or to actively compete for Church-member service needed for priesthood-led disaster recovery efforts. JustServe should not sponsor its own disaster relief effort or other Church humanitarian efforts.
JustServe specialists can use the disaster recovery function of JustServe.org to create a simple page that collects projects and needs to help support organizations and unaffiliated volunteers during a disaster.

JustServe and Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD)

JustServe specialists may regularly attend VOAD meetings as nonvoting, community-service specialists to inform and train on the use and benefits of JustServe.

JustServe specialists represent only JustServe and do not represent the Church or Latter-day Saint Charities in VOAD meetings.

State Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD) Representatives

The Church assigns members to serve as state VOAD representatives, whose roles and responsibilities include the following:

The state VOAD representative is assigned to represent the Church emergency response efforts and other Church-led service opportunities, including its affiliated volunteers and Church leader–directed assignments, in VOAD meetings.
In areas where JustServe may not regularly attend VOAD meetings, the state VOAD representative should encourage the use of JustServe, look for opportunities to connect JustServe specialists with VOAD organizations, and facilitate opportunities for JustServe specialists to periodically attend VOAD meetings to present the services available.
In all areas, the Welfare and Self-Reliance manager, state VOAD representative, and JustServe specialists should meet periodically to coordinate emergency response opportunities. This coordination effort could be accomplished as an item on already-established councils, such as JustServe working groups.