Volunteers Make Season Bright for Homeless

About 70 Santa Ana homeless will ring in the new year eating steak dinners and watching Dick Clark, thanks to the overflow of volunteers at the Orange County Catholic Worker shelter on Cypress Avenue.

The holidays tend to bring out a larger number of volunteers and Dwight Smith, director of the homeless shelter, is taking advantage of it. “It’s amazing how many people are anxious to volunteer,” said Smith, who is expecting as many volunteers as homeless Friday.

The New Year’s event is a first for the shelter.

Smith says many of the homeless are genuinely worried that, if left on the street, they would be the target of millennium mayhem.

“They’re worried every night,” said Bernie Cruer, a lawyer from Mission Viejo. “Especially the women. They’re prone to being attacked and raped.”

“It can be really bad on the streets if you don’t know people to stay with,” said Lee Meyers, one of the volunteer cooks at the shelter. Once a professional cook, he was homeless for seven months before he found the shelter.

“I like what I’m doing,” said Meyers, who’s been with the shelter for more than two years. “But my time 1/8at the shelter 3/8 is coming to an end because I want to get my life back.”

Cruer has been volunteering on Tuesday nights for about two years. “I find it’s a way to give something back,” Cruer said. “And you get more. The more you 1/8volunteer 3/8 the more you get hooked.”

About seven volunteers joined Cruer on Tuesday, preparing take-out meals to distribute to homeless at the Santa Ana Civic Center after dark.

Dwight says it’s typical to see more volunteers during the holidays but said he is happy whenever people decide to help others.

“Christmas is a time when everything shuts down,” Smith said, adding that people often find it difficult to fit volunteer time into their schedules.

Gerry Petri of Coto de Caza and his daughter, Casey, were having their first experience serving the homeless. Petri and his daughter said they planned to return after Christmas to help.

Ann Aledia, 26, is premed at UC Irvine and works at the college’s medical center in Orange. Having recently finished classes for the semester, Aledia said she was looking for something to fill her Tuesday nights.

While she is new to the Santa Ana shelter she’s not new to giving. “I just started calling shelters and found this place,” Aledia said. “I did volunteer work at Berkeley and this is just my first opportunity to volunteer 1/8in Orange County 3/8.”

Rick Ruhe, 33, recently moved into the Artists Village in downtown Santa Ana and was looking for a way to get involved in the community. “We had something like this at the Chicago Art Institute,” Ruhe said. “It’s just the holidays, I guess. It gives you a perspective as to what’s really going on.”

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Chris Ceballos can be reached at (714) 966-7440.