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California Service Corps credited with bolstering disaster response, official says
Summary
A California Volunteers official said the state'built California Service Corps has been deployed to support shelters, food banks and donation distribution during recent fires, and that investments by Gov. Newsom and the Legislature expanded the corps significantly.
The state's chief service officer, speaking on behalf of California Volunteers, said the California Service Corps has been deployed to support local disaster response, including staffing shelters and distributing food and donations after recent fires. "Since Governor Newsom got elected, he has invested an incredible amount into building up the California Service Corps, which is the largest service force in the country," the chief service officer said, adding, "we're now bigger than the Peace Corps."
The official said service corps members helped the American Red Cross set up shelters in Pasadena and that staff were on site "on the first night of the fire" where they helped serve about 1,200 people. Corps members also supported regional food bank operations serving "tens of thousands of people" and assisted YMCA distribution centers for donations, the official said.
The comment came in response to a question about how recent disaster response compares with previous events. The chief service officer said the size of the most recent disaster was "unprecedented" for California but that the expanded corps and supporting infrastructure allowed faster organization and deployment of volunteers. "That gives us the resources to respond and to organize, volunteers and deploy volunteers where they are needed," the official said.
Officials credited investments by the governor and the Legislature over the past few years for building the corps and its capacity to work with community partners. The official said the program has prioritized building trust with communities by providing materials in multiple languages and coordinating with local nonprofits and "trusted messengers on the ground" to share information. Those steps, the official said, help close communication gaps during emergencies and improve response effectiveness.
The chief service officer summed up the role of the corps in the recent response: "The infrastructure that has been built with the California Service Corps, that we now are able to deploy in times like need, have proven incredibly important for us to get through this disaster."
