Volunteering at OurCalling

by Ommar Aburaddad

I’ve always felt like I could be doing more to help homeless people. When I see them on the street asking for spare change, I’ve wondered what their story is and how they ended up there.

When I saw that IBM was offering a volunteer experience to assist Homeless people where I live, in Dallas, I signed up immediately. It was through an Organization called OurCalling. Their mission is to “help the homeless develop, heal, and strengthen the relationships that lead to a healthy and sustainable lifestyle”.

On October 8th, I woke up and drove to OurCalling’s building in downtown Dallas. I had only been at IBM for 2 months before that (during the pandemic), so it was my first opportunity to meet IBMers in person, which was a great experience.

During a quick 30 min onboarding, we learned that there are around 10,000 people without a fixed residence in Dallas, and that more than 50% of them are over the age of 50 years old. We were also told that as volunteers, we would get to choose which activity we wanted to participate in for the day. Some chose to help out in the kitchen while others chose to assist in the storeroom, where volunteers would help in providing clothing and other products that homeless individuals might need in their day to day life. Some volunteered to clean the OurCalling building. Personally, I had my eyes set on joining the “Search and Rescue” activity. This consisted of hitting the road and patrolling the streets, searching for any homeless individuals who would be willing to return to the center and receive care.

On my way to the car, I met the team I’d be working with. All of my team members were original OurCalling volunteers, some of them had been volunteers for more than a decade and had now become employees of the organization. They were all genuine, welcoming, and willing to show me the ropes.

As we departed the center, one of the most experienced members, also the driver of the vehicle, informed us that we would be going to a specific area in Dallas to pick up a couple of people he had seen a few days ago. He was going to try to bring them into the center to get them care and potentially facilitate the process for them to get government housing.

We found the two individuals by the side of a gas station. An old man in his 70s, accompanied by a younger woman in her 50s, were sitting together having a cigarette. It seemed to me that the woman was accompanying the man to take care of him. After a few minutes of back and forth, we were able to convince them to come back to the center. The man and woman first took us to an area under a bridge where they had all their possessions. As we drove back to the center, we talked to both individuals to learn about their life stories.

The man had worked all his life, but upon retiring, he found that his retirement income was not enough to even afford the cheapest apartments in Dallas. Later, I learned that this was a common cause of homelessness. Many people work their whole life doing cash jobs, however, they don’t register their income with the government. When it’s time to retire, the government only pays them the minimum retirement income as they have no official record of employment. On top of a lack of awareness on how to plan for retirement, these people usually end up not being able to afford a place to stay. This reality was eye opening. It seemed like with better education, this situation could be avoided for many people.

The woman told us that she was currently unemployed because she had an issue with her paperwork that was preventing her from verifying her identity with employers. She had moved to Texas because of her son, who was living there. She said that that her son did not know that she was currently homeless. She did not have credit on her phone to contact him either! Later, one of the OurCalling employees explained to me that this was common. Many parents do not reach out to their children for help because they do not want to feel like a burden.

We returned to the center and dropped off our new friends. They’d be taken care of by the other volunteers, provided with a warm shower, food, and new clothes if needed.

The Search and Rescue team went back out onto the street, where we ended up at an area where many homeless people lived in tents. Here I learned from the OurCalling employees that many of these people had grown accustomed to this lifestyle. They enjoyed being part of a community, and being “free” from society. They had reached a point where they became desensitized to their condition and believed they were living well. I learned that these are some of the reasons why people who get government housing can sometimes feel lonely, out of place, and isolated, and therefore they return to being homeless. My teammates told me that the best thing we can do is to keep tabs on them and try to convince them to come back to the center with us, where we can care for them and try to improve their conditions.

At the end of my shift, I finally returned to the center to regroup with the rest of the volunteers. We shared our experiences and discussed the things we had learned. As I was ready to go back home, I asked about the old man who had come back with us earlier in the day. Unfortunately, I was told that while we were gone he had decided to leave the center, and there was no way of convincing him to stay.

After stepping out of the building and saying goodbye to my new friends from OurCalling, I reflected on the harsh reality of the work these people do every day. My teammates had made it clear that helping people without homes is more complicated than I imagined, but it’s also a rewarding process when their care can actually make a difference. I felt a lot of respect for the members who have been doing this for more than a decade. They told me about encounters where they had risked their lives and sacrificed a lot to help homeless people. They have decided that this is their calling indeed.

If you are reading this, I highly recommend you volunteer with a similar organization in your area. You might visit places you have never seen and learn things you didn’t know about your city. You might meet people you wouldn’t usually encounter and learn about their tough life stories. Hopefully you can instill hope in them to make them realize that it’s never too late, and there is always a possibility of a better life out there.