THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Sunday, September 17, 1995             TAG: 9509150020
SECTION: COMMENTARY               PAGE: J4   EDITION: FINAL 
TYPE: Editorial 
                                             LENGTH: Medium:   55 lines

VOLUNTARISM ALIVE AND WELL, BUT IT HAS LIMITS ALLEN ASKS TOO MUCH

In Fredericksburg this week George Allen convened the Governor's Summit on Community Responses to Welfare Reform and urged volunteers to mobilize to make his new program work.

This state's - indeed this nation's - volunteers mobilized long ago, Governor. They're a huge army that advances on poverty and many other societal problems with commitment, vigor, sacrifice, even heroism.

Government public-assistance personnel have worked with volunteers for years. But charitable agencies are stretched thin enough to cause worry about compassion burnout. Just as at the state level, national officials have warned Congress, which is also looking to volunteers to do the public sector's work, that there are limits to what they can do.

Some agencies, particularly large, crucial ones, say they are drowning in record-keeping required by the IRS, private foundations, United Way and others. How much would paperwork grow to accommodate the kind of partnerships Allen seeks?

Also, agencies report that the replacement ranks have shrunk. Many people who in an earlier era would have had time to help others have necessarily joined the work force to help themselves, some to keep their own families off the dole. Even the retiree pool gets smaller. More who have retired from one job have taken another.

Yet the output of good works is impressive. More than 300 area agencies are registered with the Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia, which has supplied them with 9 million pounds of food in the past 12 months. To keep its mammoth operation going, the Foodbank itself relies on volunteers for as many hours as paid staffers work.

In downtown Portsmouth an incredible amount of community service goes into the Oasis Social Ministry. It thrives only because the city's churches and synagogues have pooled people and other resources to make it work.

Food pantries, thrift shops, shelters, soup kitchens, among many other nonprofit ventures, serve tens of thousands of poor Virginians. Government social-service agencies routinely refer the homeless and hungry to them.

Americans are said to be the most generous people on Earth not just with their money but with themselves: time, talent and, often, muscle.

But there are limits. Debra Wilson, one of those who heard Allen's call, works with the NAACP Youth Council in Stafford, helping teenage mothers. She thinks the added state burden would be overwhelming. ``Now all of a sudden,'' she said, ``they're saying we want you to do even more. It's like they're throwing everything on us now.''

With volunteers already filling so many holes in the state's safety net, Allen's concern should be to mend the net. by CNB