Senior volunteers enhance life at St. Joseph Villa

IC photo Marie Mischel

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Evert House (left), a member of Saint Ambrose Parish, has been a volunteer at CHRISTUS St. Joseph Villa for seven years. ?I'm retired, and you need to do things to keep going,? he said of his volunteer work.

SALT LAKE CITY – From helping with Bingo to pushing wheelchairs during outings, CHRISTUS St. Joseph Villa volunteers have been doing everything they can to enhance the lives of residents at the Catholic senior care facility since 1947.

"The majority of our St. Joseph Villa volunteers are over the age of 65," said Ginger Moulton, chief development officer for CHRISTUS St. Joseph Villa in Salt Lake City. "They always, first and foremost, want to help make a difference in residents' lives, and they've been doing that for 50 years. It's wonderful to have them."

Volunteers are involved with a number of activities. They organize monthly birthday parties for the residents as well as the weekly sing-a-longs, assist the recreational therapy department with outings, visit individually with the residents and offer a regular arts and crafts session.

Although Bingo is the most popular activity for the residents, the sing-a-longs also are very well liked, Moulton said. The volunteers "have a piano player and they play the old songs that residents know and love," she said. "If there is a resident who is able to get up and dance a little bit with them, they'll do that, but they go around and sing with them and interact with them."

The villa's gift shop is open only when a volunteer is available to run the cash register, Moulton said. "People sometimes think that the gift shop is not as interactive with residents as the sing-a-long or Bingo, but we have residents who come down, and they might not buy anything, but they come down and they visit with the volunteer. If they're not there, they'll ask where they are because they're very concerned about them. They have developed relationships."

The gift shop opened in 1984 with the help of Maxine Giovacchini, 82, who has chaired that committee ever since. She also has been the volunteers' parliamentarian for 12 years and is a past president of the group. Both her mother and her mother-in-law were residents at the villa.

The villa's staff as well as the sisters and priests who serve there — especially Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word Sr. Ambrose Naughton, who was there when Giovacchini's mother passed away, and Sr. Thaddeus Quinlan, who was present when her mother-in-law died — all have made a difference in Giovacchini's life that's hard to describe, she said. "These sweet people gave such wonderful support not only to our family members who were residents but to the whole family. You just appreciate that kind of relationship."

Volunteering is a way to give back and show her appreciation for the help she's been given, she said. "I would say it's one of my greatest blessings to be a volunteer. As long as I am able I will continue to be a Villa volunteer."

Giovacchini and her husband also are members of the Friends of St. Joseph Villa, a volunteer group that raises funds for charity care at the villa, which provides necessary items such as wheelchairs or hearing aids for residents who can't afford them. "Each year we manage to raise two or three hundred thousand dollars for the charity care fund," Giovacchini said.

The annual Hope Benefit by the Friends of St. Joseph Villa is scheduled this year for April 8. It will honor the Right Rev. Carolyn Tanner Irish, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Utah.

"All of the things that the volunteers do really enhance the residents' lives," Moulton said. "It's an extra friendship, extra love, extra caring that the volunteers can provide and it really does enhance our residents' lives."