• DVS's flagship COVID-19 program is the Mission: VetCheck initiative, wherein volunteer veterans make supportive check-in calls to peers in their community. The calls provide vital information including where to get free meals, COVID-19 testing locations, and how to access online mental health support.
  
• The Veterans Voices Project is DVS's oral history initiative designed to preserve the stories of New York City veterans. Learn how you can volunteer as an interviewer to help document veteran stories.
• Veterans, families, and supporters can help pack HelloFresh meal kits on Wednesday mornings at the Campaign Against Hunger’s Brooklyn Food Distribution Center.  Meal kits will then be distributed to veteran families in need throughout NYC. This project is a collaboration between DVS, the New York State Division of Veterans’ Services, the Campaign Against Hunger, and Black Veterans for Social Justice. To learn how you can volunteer, contact DVS at connect@veterans.nyc.gov.

Mission Continues mobilizes veterans to serve their community through volunteer projects across NYC.

• For ways to volunteer in NYC's relief efforts visit the Help Now NYC page.
• Volunteer with Invisible Hands to deliver groceries to New Yorkers who are unable to leave their homes due to a disability or an increased vulnerability to COVID-19. You can only perform deliveries if you are feeling healthy, are displaying no symptoms, have not traveled out of the country or come in contact with a sick person in the past 14 days, and have been practicing social distancing.

Help NYC's most vulnerable population from experiencing social isolation. Volunteer with the New York City Department for the Aging to make phone calls to older adults.

All volunteers must:

• Be age 21 or older
• Pass a background check (a Social Security number is required)
• Be patient with and kind to older adults
• Maintain the confidentiality of people served

To learn more call 212-AGING-NYC (212-244-6469) or visit the New York City Department for the Aging volunteer page.

COVID-19 has caused a dramatic reduction in the U.S. blood supply, putting Americans in need of blood transfusions at serious risk. Make an appointment to donate blood with the New York Blood Center.

• New York Cares offers virtual and on-the-ground volunteer projects to deliver meals to vulnerable communities, support seniors and children, and restore neighborhoods.
• Hope for New York offers several virtual volunteer opportunities to serve children, the chronically ill, the elderly, new immigrants, people with disabilities, and the homeless. Examples of volunteer opportunities include:
  • mentoring children online
  • sending cards and letters to nursing home residents
  • teaching ESL classes online
  • facilitating virtual career-readiness events for formerly incarcerated individuals
• Mission: VetCheck is an initiative that allows volunteers to make supportive check-in calls to New York City veterans. Volunteers provide their peers with vital information on essential public services, COVID-19 resources and testing locations, and online mental health support. Learn how to become a Mission: VetCheck volunteer through New York Cares.
• Veteran Voices Project (VVP) is an oral history project designed to preserve the story of NYC's veteran community. Veterans can volunteer to contribute their story to the VVP library or volunteer as an interviewer. Learn more about VVP.

See all of Hope for New York's virtual volunteer opportunities