Selected Volunteer Work

Over the past year, I have regularly organized and hosted a variety of small (8-20 people) in-person events for 45+ adults in Metro Vancouver, with a particular focus on thoughtfully selected opportunities to enjoy live music and good conversation.
I identify strong event opportunities and then manage event logistics, as well as venue coordination and member communication, through the Meetup.com platform to ensure a positive experience for participants.

I have sat on and/or chaired the gym, art, bike and landscaping committees at my housing co-op and currently chair the landscaping committee.
Highlights of my contributions include organizing several successful work parties for the landscaping committee, hosting multiple craft workshops for the art committee, conducting surveys to determine member preferences on projects for the gym and bike committees, and drafting a proposal for new indoor bike parking.

As well as maintaining a plot at the Strathcona Community Gardens for seven years, I served as the society’s board secretary for two years.
I regularly attended our monthly work parties, the purpose of which was for members to help maintain the common areas and facilities in this three-acre, park-like community garden.

I was appointed to this new city committee, whose mandate was to advise council on issues affecting tenants and rental housing.
In early 2017, I was elected as the committee’s chair and used this opportunity to advocate to the city on ways to increase the quality and amount of purpose-built rental housing in Vancouver by creating and passing resolutions, speaking on behalf of the committee at public input opportunities, and organizing a workshop to help council candidates across Metro Vancouver to learn about the obstacles and challenges of building purpose-built rental housing

I took over and renamed this dormant meet-up group with the goal of reviving it and increasing its appeal to people who were interested in attending public talks and lectures, documentaries and other intellectually stimulating local events.
One of the most popular event series that I offered in this group was a book night where members were invited to talk about any book they wanted to, as long as it was one that had made an impact on them and they would recommend to others.

In mid-2016, I was one of several people who co-founded a new volunteer housing advocacy group, called Abundant Housing Vancouver.

This group’s mission is “to strengthen Vancouver’s food security by harvesting backyard fruit trees and delivering it to organizations serving members in our community who typically have reduced access to fresh produce.”
My contributions as a board member included cleaning up the organization’s tree-owners database, organizing the season wrap-up party, and writing a successful grant application to the Vancouver Foundation.

I started this meetup group because I was interested in cohousing and wanted to meet others people in Metro Vancouver who shared that interest. At the time, there was no public way to do that unless you were already involved with an established co-housing group.
I organized several successful events, including coffee meetings, info nights and tours of three local cohousing communities

My contributions to this volunteer-run community radio station included sitting on the board and being a regular volunteer on a weekly program.
As a programmer, I pitched ideas at story meetings, researched and booked guests, wrote interview scripts and sometimes hosted this three-hour, long-running Saturday-morning current affairs show (Redeye).
I also worked on a short paid contract to organize the station’s annual fundraising drive, the Autumn Airlift.