Last year, 3,469 volunteers gave 23,501 hours of service to help impact over half a million people at events through civic engagement projects and educational opportunities across all of 2019. Everything from our youth programs, to our #MeTooLGBTQ Conference, women’s programs, Latinx and APIMEDA Coalitions, Census work, and voter outreach are made possible through the power of volunteering.
As a nonprofit we are always tasked with doing more with less. It is our community members who contribute their talents to help us thrive, their insights help us to grow, and their valuable time makes it possible.
Just a few years ago, our entire volunteer leadership team fit inside our small conference room at the Pride office. Today, over 150 people have a leadership role within the organization envisioning and coordinating our year-round events and programs, while always bringing in and lifting up the next generation of leaders.
San Diego Pride is unlike other large events of our scale and production quality because our community volunteers make it possible rather than a large for-profit production company. It is the skill and leadership of volunteers that keep our events free and low cost and allow us to give proceeds from our events back out to community nonprofits. Last year alone we granted out over $340,000.
Every year at Pride, I am inspired by our volunteers, people who are looking for their found family and looking to make connections while serving the community. The volunteer who finds their new best friend or the love of their life. The volunteer who helps someone connect to sobriety services or HIV testing for the first time. The volunteer who gets to see the expression on someone’s face who is experiencing Pride and acceptance for the first time. These are the volunteers of Pride.
This year, we are all being met with new challenges, and again our volunteers are adapting and diving into this work with passionate altruism. Our planning and programs continue in safe virtual spaces while volunteers create and take part in more events than ever before. They are helping our Pride continue to connect our community while we remain physically apart.
It’s National Volunteer Appreciation week, so if you know a Pride volunteer please take a moment to thank them. I am personally forever in their debt for all they build and make possible for our community. They bring us together, and Together We Rise.
With Gratitude and Pride, Fernando Zweifach López
Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs
Executive Director
San Diego Pride
Learn more about what it means to be a Pride volunteer here.
Fernando Lopez was the Executive Director of San Diego Pride. Lopez’s years of LGBT advocacy, nonprofit management, public education, diversity consulting, media relations, guest lectures, and organizing have made them a consistent presence ensuring the struggles of the LGBT community are ever visible.
