For the past several months, a couple of long-time donors to Community Supported Shelters have joined us for two hours a week at our main office to do whatever needs doing. 

While this may sound like a modest amount of time, Sandy and Percy’s consistent, constructive, and upbeat engagement demonstrates a truth that is often overlooked: big issues can be meaningfully addressed in small increments of time.

Percy and Sandy are the Swiss Army knife of CSS volunteers, meeting whatever need we might have, and helping us address projects that our staff just can’t get to during the regular course of the week. So far, these two have helped us to create and organize files, address envelopes, or drive to local businesses asking for silent auction donations.

These two perform folk music as the Cypress Home Duo, and shared their formidable musical skills by accompaning the CSS Songbirds at our 2024 CSS Annual Celebration. 

Sandy holds a Master’s Degree in Music from University of Oregon and has spent her career working as a freelance musician, playing for the Eugene Opera, Eugene Symphony, and the Bach Festival among others. Percy is a visual artist, sold candles as a vendor in the first seven seasons of the Saturday Market and Oregon Country Fair, and spent 16 years at the University of Oregon as the graphic artist for the Computer Sciences Department magazine, The Computing Teacher.

“Driving around town and seeing what’s going on, you want to do something tangible,” Sandy said, explaining her desire to volunteer with CSS. “It’s easy to say ‘too big’ or ‘too small’ so you do nothing. But action is the antidote to despair. We’re grateful to have an organization doing things for the unhoused.” 

Sandy has been active in volunteering through the years but wanted to find an opportunity to volunteer with Percy. The couple attended the annual dinner celebrating CSS’s 10-year anniversary last year, and that experience inspired them to step up their involvement with the organization.

Percy and Sandy describe volunteering together as “enriching” and say that combining their efforts has brought a level of efficiency that they would lack as individuals. Percy “enjoyed the office stuff” working together to audit client files saying that it was “easy and fun.” With a commitment of two hours a week as volunteers who are game to help wherever we need it most, what they do for CSS changes from week to week. Next up is organizing the storage space behind our navigation office. 

They say that seeing the operations from the inside of CSS was illuminating to them as donors. “Oh yeah!” they both agreed. “There are a lot of balls in the air, a lot going on” in the controlled chaos of our main office where every space is leveraged to help us provide shelter and services to our unhoused clients. 

Behind the scenes, Sandy and Percy have looked inside our “welcome totes” to see the sheets, solar lights, water bottle, and sleeping bag that greets each new community member when they move into a Hut. These totes are stacked next to a row of new Hut walls waiting for installation, just on the other side of the shelf where food boxes are assembled to go out to our communities during the week.

In the controlled chaos of the reception area, kitchen, navigation office, shop, and supply area, “everyone was nice and we felt welcome and appreciated,” said Sandy. Percy agreed, saying that volunteering with CSS has proven to be a great way to educate themselves about the subject of homelessness.