Congratulations to one of our wonderful CASA Volunteers Tammy McClure. She was the Volunteer of the Year award recipient at the State CASA Conference last Saturday. It’s a well deserved award as Tammy not only does a great job advocating for children in the dependency and neglect system, she does so much more!
Tammy is a current CASA Advocate volunteer, but her passion for helping others and serving surpasses even being an amazing CASA Advocate. Her current job includes caring for the elderly, and she also shares her love for cooking and baking. Every special Holiday, Tammy comes by our office and gives the staff in our agency a special treat of homemade goodies. During meetings over the lunch hour, she will bring in lunch for the staff to share. Tammy has a contagious laugh and a caring heart and has a kind word for everyone she meets. She is dependable and can be counted on when we need the help. I have heard her tell others: “Being a CASA volunteer is awesome. Not only do you impact a child’s life, but at least for me, the reward has been unmeasurable.” During COVID, when staff were hunting down supplies- masks, sanitizer, etc., Tammy was able to use her connections to alert us to stock on hand in local stores. She will also step in to help with office related tasks that come up as a need for our volunteer ambassador program and helps at outreach booths throughout the year helping to bring awareness to the community about our mission and helping children with activities. Other examples are that she will come help stuff swag bags for our Superhero fundraising event and has been on our Spring Gala silent auction committee as well as Superhero committee for many years. She has helped bring in funds to our agency by getting some amazing silent auction items for our gala. This last year, she spent a day in Estes where she had previously lived and had many connections to gather items. She was able to obtain overnight lodging and gift certificates for events and meals donated. For the past two years she has participated in our awareness event called Save Jane where she reads “names” (John Doe or Jane Doe) representing children who have had reports about child abuse in our county for the year prior. She doesn’t stop there. She is always calling and coming in to ask what more can she do. One of our CASA volunteers was struggling to make visits with her CASA children as she didn’t have daycare options, Tammy had mentioned she would be willing to babysit if a CASA could not make visits. One of our other CASA volunteers had a medical emergency and Tammy immediately reached out to see what their meal preferences were so she could make them meals. One of our supervisors had knee surgery and she would not take no for an answer, she brought her meals multiple times while she was out on leave. Children is Tammy’s passion, and you can see it when her eyes light up when she is helping children succeed in any way possible. You can see it in the way she talks about her own CASA children or in the children she works with at her church. She knows that all the staff here at Life Stories are also working with that same passion and mission and she does anything to support our agency and staff to meet our goals for fundraising, working cases, wellness of staff and other volunteers and anything in between. Tammy is a truly selfless person. It is hard to explain all the times she has gone out of her way to give hope to others. We need caring souls like Tammy at the best of times, but these last couple of years it has been vitally important. We would love to see her win this award as she reminds us that even in the most difficult of times not to dwell on the negative, but rather look around and see how we can be a “Tammy” to others.
