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PHOTO: GAVIN BAILEY, KRISTEN SOUCY, JASON DARE
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Charity on a Budget
BY MELISSA KORN
Young adults, struggling with student loans and small salaries, often can’t afford to write checks to their favorite causes. And many who can aren’t satisfied just making a financial contribution. So instead of—or in addition to—donating money, a number of people in their 20s and early 30s are giving back to their communities and favored causes by donating time. Here is a closer look at some of them: PROTECTING THE EARTH Since 1995, Gavin Bailey has spent what amounts to almost a year clearing hiking trails in Colorado. He first teamed up with the Colorado Trail Foundation on a whim for a two-week stint as a teenager. Now, at age 30, Mr. Bailey still spends at least one week a year rerouting hiking trails that have been overused, pulling tree stumps and moving boulders to make the 483-mile Denver-to-Durango trail more hiker-, biker- and horseback rider-friendly. “I’ll do at least one crew a year until I’m too old to pick up a pack,” says Mr. Bailey, of Fort Collins, Colo. The volunteers he led this summer ranged in age from mid-teens to almost 80. Mr. Bailey says that although he is a staunch environmentalist, money is too tight to donate much to the cause. He says he takes more pride in working for a charity than just giving money to it. “I feel more productive actually being out there, seeing things get done, leaving a mark that I know is going to last, that people are going to use and appreciate,” he says. “Not only do you leave a mark, but you leave a sentiment behind, you set an example.” LOVING ANIMALS Kristen Soucy was afraid that volunteering at an animal shelter would be too depressing. “I always felt like I couldn’t volunteer at a shelter because it would make me too sad and I’d want to adopt all of” the animals, says the 32-year-old Orlando, Fla., legal assistant. “You don’t want to acknowledge the bad and the ugly.” After picking up a pamphlet about the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals at a charity walk in early 2007, Ms. Soucy’s desire to help outweighed her concerns. She checked out the organization and became hooked. Ms. Soucy, who owns two cats and a dog, now spends almost every Saturday at the SPCA of Central Florida as a “kitty cuddler,” holding and playing with the cats available for adoption and helping potential adoptive families interact with them. She also works special events, like the annual FurBall charity auction. When she saw the shelter being overrun by kittens too young to be fixed—and therefore to be adopted—Ms. Soucy offered to foster a litter until they could be given away. She housed an extra four kittens this September, giving over a spare bedroom to the brood. Ms. Soucy, whose salary is in the low $40,000 range at an Orlando law firm, pays yearly dues of $30 to the SPCA and gives the group about $100 a year in other donations. “If money was no object, I would be doing a lot more, and I would be doing a lot more financially,” Ms. Soucy says. “But I’m not a wealthy person, and I do have the time.” INSPIRING WITH SCIENCE Jason Dare spends his days with children. And cockroaches, fish and snakes. The 34-year-old San Franciscan is the founder and owner of Pace Learning Center, a for-profit after-school tutoring program in the metro area. When not running that business, Mr. Dare volunteers at the California Academy of Sciences, a museum and research center boasting an aquarium and indoor rain forest. There, Mr. Dare does everything from the glamorous—running presentations about the local ecosystem while scuba diving in the Philippine coral-reef tank—to the mundane—cleaning algae from said tank. Mr. Dare also speaks to school groups and teaches other docents how to handle reptiles and amphibians. It seemed a perfect fit from the start, says Mr. Dare, who grew up two blocks from the museum. An avid marine hobbyist who has been scuba-certified for five years, he jumped at the chance to volunteer when the museum advertised it was looking for help last year. He now devotes at least eight hours a week to the academy. Mr. Dare, who makes around $60,000 a year running Pace, doesn’t support the science academy financially, saying he is more able to give time than money. “I really wanted to volunteer. And I wanted to teach. I wanted to inspire kids to want to learn,” says Mr. Dare. “If you can inspire someone while they’re young, that organically grows, and they teach someone else…and I think that’s the only way this world can really change.”
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