It was four years ago when Harriett Dever, retired after working 50 years in the office at Park View Middle School in Cranston, reported for volunteer duty at the Providence headquarters of Rhode Island PBS.
“I came for a day,” she said with a wry grin. “I got adopted.”
Since then Dever, a Providence resident, has not missed a day of her volunteer work for WSBE-TV Channel 36, which broadcasts Rhode Island PBS. She is there all day every weekday, 40 hours each week, doing whatever needs to be done for Rhode Island’s only public television station.
“I enjoy every day,” she said. “It makes me happy to be part of the PBS family. I enjoy and appreciate being part of the team.”
Dever is, in fact, replacing a full-time staffer whose job was eliminated due to budget cuts, said Jeffrey E. Hartley, auction director for Rhode Island PBS. “She’s picked up all the work,” he said. “It’s an enormous amount of work she does.”
On a recent day, Dever was busy indeed, calling potential donors for the Rhode Island PBS Spring Auction, which will be broadcast live on six nights from April 21 through April 26, and is the largest single fundraiser at Channel 36. The station also holds an arts auction every November and a wine-tasting event in the fall.
With a goal of $200,000, the spring auction is expected to bring in approximately 15 percent of all funds raised this year, according to Tracey L. Cugno, director of development. Fundraising accounts for about $1.25 million of the station’s $3.2 million annual operating budget, Cugno said.
And the auction costs almost nothing to put on, other than the cost of mailing and printing.
That’s because a total of 350 volunteers, like Dever, do most of the work to prepare for the auction. The work includes soliciting donors, acknowledging gifts, writing copy for the broadcasts and even picking up donated items themselves. On broadcast nights, volunteers from the corporate underwriters, representing some of the largest businesses in Rhode Island, will man the telephones. Caterers donate food each night; massage therapists work for free on hands sore from gripping telephone receivers.
Some 2,000 items will be offered, all donated, from AAA membership to zoo passes. For the first time this spring, viewers can bid on 60 high-end “spotlight” items now on the PBS Web site, www.ripbs.org, through the end of the auction April 26.
Items include such luscious prizes as dinner for eight at the “chef’s table” at The Capital Grille, an eight-day “secluded adventure” at Paradise Bay in Grenada and, the most expensive offering of all, provided by “your New England Toyota dealer,” a 2009 Camry hybrid sedan valued at $26,209.
Tim Draper, director of marketing for Navigant Credit Union, one of the auction’s corporate underwriters, said his company supports the event because of the value of PBS programming and the name recognition afforded Navigant statewide.
He cited a Saturday morning television show on Channel 36, produced by America’s credit unions and Junior Achievement, called “Biz Kids,” which teaches financial literacy to pre-teens and teenagers. The 26-week series is “phenomenal,” Draper said, and not something you would find on commercial television.
“And, of course, we get some statewide recognition,” he added, “it’s all about branding, it’s all about associating yourself with the best in the state.” Navigant, headquartered in Smithfield, is particularly seeking statewide exposure now since changing its name from Credit Union Central Falls last year.
Other corporate underwriters of the April auction are Bank of America, Koch Eye Associates, Sovereign Bank and Amica Mutual Insurance.
Most of this year’s 375 donors needed only “gentle reminders” to provide items for the auction, Hartley said, but he and Cugno stressed that Channel 36 is careful to avoid “over-soliciting” longtime business supporters of proven loyalty.
“You just have to be really nice,” Hartley said of cultivating donors and sponsors. “You have to be really sensitive to their needs. People are so busy that giving donations to a nonprofit is not at the top of their list. You have to be very gentle.”
Mike Stultz, of Warwick, volunteers his services as a photographer to take pictures of auction items for posting on the PBS Web site. After 30 years with Continental Airlines, he started what he calls “my second career” after graduating from the Rhode Island School of Design last year.
On a recent day, he was taking pictures of jewelry and of a baseball signed by Sen. John McCain, Republican candidate for president, who signed the ball during his recent Rhode Island visit. “I want to give back to PBS; I’m a big fan of PBS, and this gives me a chance to help out,” he said. “I meet lots of great people and I get my name out there.”
A senior at St. Mary Academy-Bay View in East Providence, Taylor Cotter, also of East Providence, plans to attend Northeastern University in Boston next year to study communications, so volunteering at Channel 36 is perfect for her because it gives her the opportunity to learn about television work from the inside.
“She’s a really good writer,” Hartley said of Cotter. Using information supplied by donors, she writes concise copy that announcers will read live on the air to describe each of the 2,000 items up for auction. “I think I’ve done about 25 or 30 [descriptions] today,” she said.
Volunteer Bernadette “Bunny” Quindazzi, of Scituate, a retired Warwick elementary school teacher, does just about anything that needs to be done to prepare for the auction because she believes in public television.
“It’s a step up from what’s on the other channels,” she said. “It’s entertaining, it’s informative, it’s educational and it’s current.”
And she believes in Rhode Island PBS.
“Volunteers here always feel appreciated,” Quindazzi said. “I enjoy it here. My philosophy is, you find happiness by bringing it to other people.” •
