Below are 501(c)(3) organizations and local community groups where your volunteer efforts will effectively aid the relief effort.

Be advised: service needs and opportunities in crisis zones can change rapidly. The information on this page will be updated regularly, but all volunteers are urged to connect directly with sponsoring organizations to determine where service opportunities exist at the present time.

Additionally, mechanisms are in place to consider additional Sandy relief organizations for this list. Please email civic.engagement@nyu.edu if you would like to alert us to a potential partner. This resource was last updated Dec 12, 2012.

Organizations by Location

• Rockaways
• Staten Island
  
• Coney Island
• Long Island
• New Jersey

Rockaways

The founders of New Orleans's Common Ground Health Clinic (started in the wake of Hurricane Katrina) are spearheading medical and behavioral health support operations in sections of the Far Rockaways. People's Relief provides free direct medical care while facilitating residents' transitions to re-emerging systems of health care and support.

Volunteer needs: medical professionals, behavioral health specialists, social workers, patient advocates, counselors, therapists, and child-workers for those affected by post-traumatic stress disorder.

• Location: Beach 106 Street at Rockaway Boulevard
• Time needs: individual days, recurring days, or extended commitments.
• Registering: Email peoplesrelief@gmail.com to confirm project opportunities.
  

The World Cares Center (501c3) has an eleven-year history delivering disaster preparedness and response trainings to citizens, youth, seniors, and leaders in communities in the New York Tri-State area, throughout the United States, and abroad. WCC is training, coordinating, and deploying volunteer teams to address the immediate recovery effort in the five boroughs of New York and in New Jersey.

Volunteer needs: clearing and cleaning rooms, muck-outs and demolition, delivering sleeping bags and supplies, driving vehicles, liaising with homeowners, assisting in disposal or salvage of possessions, mold remittance, and more.

• Location: Tri-State-wide
• Time needs: day projects are updated regularly
• Registering: Register online for trainings / relief operations
  

Since Day 1 after the storm, Respond and Rebuild has been on the ground responding to the greatest needs of communities most affected by the crisis. Respond and Rebuild’s approach to disaster relief, which members put to use in Haiti and New Orleans, is focused on sharing and disseminating collective skills and expertise across a wide range of responders, volunteers, and residents in affected areas. They are committed to being part of the region's long-haul recovery.

Volunteer needs: From the website: "Volunteers work intimately with residents, picking through flood damaged belongings and gutting out flood damaged residences. It’s people helping people to pick up the pieces of a life, and with each person working, each couch thrown away, each wall pulled down, a little more healing, peace, friendship and light enters the world."

• Location: Rockaways-wide
  
• Time needs: varying
  
• Registering: Register online for trainings / relief operations
  

Habitat for Humanity International is launching a multi-phase response to help communities devastated by Superstorm Sandy along the U.S. East Coast. This effort includes a range of services that will address both the short-term and long-term need for safe and decent housing.

Volunteer needs: Habitat's disaster response team and volunteers are assessing the damage to homes and communities, helping homeowners make repairs to houses that received damage from the storm, and helping with community cleanup efforts. Over the long term, Habitat will work to build, rehabilitate, or repair affordable housing in partnership with low-income families impacted by the storm.

• Location: Tri-State-wide
  
• Time needs: varying
  
• Registering: Register online for alerts about upcoming opportunities.
  

New York Cares helps children and adults through thousands of flexibly scheduled, hands-on projects. Regular service opportunities include tutoring children and adults, playing with / providing library access for children and seniors who lack access to recreational facilities, revitalizing parks and schools, preparing and serving meals to the homeless and hungry, and more.

Volunteer needs: home muck-outs, meal services, canvassing and check-ins with residents, donation sorting, supply distribution, and more, in addition to New York Cares’s normal service activities

• Location: Brooklyn and Queens
  
• Time needs: Flexible, with day projects, short-term commitments, and long-term commitments.
• Registering: Register online for upcoming projects.
  

Occupy Sandy is a mutual aid group helping connect residents with and initiate relief, support, rebuilding, and recovery systems in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. Occupy Sandy is based in the Church of St. Luke and St. Matthew in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn.

Volunteer needs: on-site needs are various, including receiving and sorting donations, filling orders for delivery, communicating with organizations in need of aid, dispatching groups, and more. Volunteers may also arrive to be dispatched to the field, where needs are extremely various, including: clean-up work (bleaching, shoveling, raking, bagging garbage); demolition; canvassing and assessments (neighbor check-ins, volunteer organizing, database work); driving supplies and volunteers; receiving, sorting, and redistributing supplies, and much more.

• Location: 520 Clinton Avenue, 11238, with dispatches to various sites
  
• Time needs: Flexible day-long, short-term, and long-term commitments.
• Registering: Register online for upcoming projects.
  

The American Red Cross feeds and delivers supplies to many struggling to persevere in the aftermath of the storm. Volunteer efforts will allow hurricane-affected residents to receive disaster relief items at fixed Red Cross distribution sites located in key areas.

Volunteer needs: medically credentialed individuals to support NYC shelters; sorting and delivering disaster relief items (blankets, flashlights, gloves, etc.); Providing meals (either pre-packaged or or individually served) to hurricane-affected residents at mobile or fixed sites.

• Location: Various, with staging hubs at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, Miller Field in Staten Island and MacArthur Airport in Long Island.
  
• Time needs: Flexible day projects
  
• Registering: Connect online to register for projects.
  

Staten Island

Occupy Staten Island is a mutual aid group working as part of the Occupy Sandy network, helping connect people to people to relieve, support, rebuild, and grow our communities in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. Occupy Staten Island is based in the Saint Margaret Mary School.

On-site volunteer needs include: operating the “Free Store” to greet people, handle donations, and fill orders for delivery; facilitating the tool loan hub; aiding volunteer orientations; tracking groups and supplies; answering phone hotlines and communicating with other hubs; and more. Families with children/teens are welcome.

In-the-field volunteer needs include: clean-up (bleaching, shoveling, raking, bagging garbage); demolition; canvassing, including field work, dispatching work, and database work; driving supplies and volunteers; and more. Cleanup and demo are adults-only; canvassing volunteers must be 16+.

 

• Location: 1128 Olympia Blvd, Staten Island, 10306
  
• Time needs: Flexible day projects and short-term commitments
  
• Registering: Connect online to confirm project needs.
  

The World Cares Center (501c3) has an eleven-year history delivering disaster preparedness and response trainings to citizens, youth, seniors, and leaders in communities in the New York Tri-State area, throughout the United States, and abroad. WCC is training, coordinating, and deploying volunteer teams to address the immediate recovery effort in the five boroughs of New York and in New Jersey.

Volunteer needs: clearing and cleaning rooms, muck-outs and demolition, delivering sleeping bags and supplies, driving vehicles, liaising with homeowners, assisting in disposal or salvage of possessions, mold remittance, and more.

 

• Location: Tri-State-wide
• Time needs: day projects are updated regularly
• Registering: Volunteers must register online for trainings / relief operations
  

Habitat for Humanity International is launching a multi-phase response to help communities devastated by Superstorm Sandy along the U.S. East Coast. This effort includes a range of services that will address both the short-term and long-term need for safe and decent housing.

Volunteer needs: Habitat's disaster response team and volunteers are assessing the damage to homes and communities, helping homeowners make repairs to houses that received damage from the storm, and helping with community cleanup efforts. Over the long term, Habitat will work to build, rehabilitate, or repair affordable housing in partnership with low-income families impacted by the storm.
 

• Location: Tri-State-wide
  
• Time needs: varying
  
• Registering: Register online for alerts about upcoming opportunities.
  

The American Red Cross feeds and delivers supplies to many struggling to persevere in the aftermath of the storm. Volunteer efforts will allow hurricane-affected residents to receive disaster relief items at fixed Red Cross distribution sites located in key areas.

Volunteer needs: medically credentialed individuals to support NYC shelters; sorting and delivering disaster relief items (blankets, flashlights, gloves, etc.); Providing meals (either pre-packaged or or individually served) to hurricane-affected residents at mobile or fixed sites.
 

• Location: Various, with staging hubs at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, Miller Field in Staten Island and MacArthur Airport in Long Island.
  
• Time needs: Flexible day projects
  
• Registering: Volunteers should connect online to register for projects.
  

Coney Island

The founders of New Orleans's Common Ground Health Clinic (started in the wake of Hurricane Katrina) are spearheading medical and behavioral health support operations in sections of Coney Island and Brighton Beach. People's Relief at Coney Island / Brighton Beach provides free direct medical care while facilitating residents' transitions to re-emerging systems of health care and support, and is especially focused on providing medical care and needed supplies to the elderly and disabled. People's Relief works with medical volunteers, residents, and leaders in Coney Island;l Community Board 13; DecoloNYC; Cojeco; Coney Island Development Corporation; Occupy Sandy; NY Cares; Portlight Strategies Inc.; and many independent volunteers.

Volunteer needs: daily from 10am – 5pm for canvassing and assessments, stocking and supply, and more; additionally, medical and wellness professionals of every specialization, behavioral health specialists, therapists, social workers, patient advocates, counselors, acupuncturists, body workers, herbalists, and more. Interpreters – especially Russian, as well as Spanish – are badly needed.

• Location: Kaiser Park Club House at 2828 Neptune Ave. / W. 29th St
• Time needs: Flexible day projects, short-term commitments, and long-term committments
  
• Registering: Connect online and confirm projects via email.
  

The American Red Cross feeds and delivers supplies to many struggling to persevere in the aftermath of the storm. Volunteer efforts will allow hurricane-affected residents to receive disaster relief items at fixed Red Cross distribution sites located in key areas.

Volunteer needs: medically credentialed individuals to support NYC shelters; sorting and delivering disaster relief items (blankets, flashlights, gloves, etc.); Providing meals (either pre-packaged or or individually served) to hurricane-affected residents at mobile or fixed sites.

• Location: Various, with staging hubs at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, Miller Field in Staten Island and MacArthur Airport in Long Island.
  
• Time needs: Flexible day projects
  
• Registering: Volunteers should connect online to register for projects.
  

Long Island

Long Island Cares organizes resources from a range of industries to fight for a hunger-free Long Island. “Long Island’s First Food Bank and Comprehensive Hunger Assistance Organization,” they provide emergency food, sponsor programs that help families achieve self-sufficiency, and educate the public about the causes and consequences of hunger.

Volunteer Needs: large food distributions, food drives, fund raising, special events support, administrative tasks, and light warehouse job such as sorting food. Facebook listings are the most up-to-date.

• Location: Bases in Hauppauge and Freeport, with operations throughout LI.
• Time needs: Flexible long and short term projects
  
• Registering: register online for notifications of upcoming service projects
  

The Long Island Volunteer Center serves as a local resource for volunteerism and community service initiatives throughout Nassau and Suffolk counties, working closely with neighborhood agencies, the national HandsOn Network, and the Long Island VOAD (Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster).

Volunteer Needs: LIVC connects volunteers to specific requests from partner agencies, such as Red Cross shelters, pet shelters, food rescue and food bank agencies including Island Harvest and Long Island Cares/Harry Chapin Food Bank, Salvation Army donation sites, and faith-based and disaster groups doing debris cleanups in affected communities, including NECHAMA and All Hands volunteers.

• Location: Nassau/Suffolk Counties
• Time needs: flexible
• Registering: register online to begin volunteering

The American Red Cross feeds and delivers supplies to many struggling to persevere in the aftermath of the storm. Volunteer efforts will allow hurricane-affected residents to receive disaster relief items at fixed Red Cross distribution sites located in key areas.

Volunteer needs: medically credentialed individuals to support NYC shelters; sorting and delivering disaster relief items (blankets, flashlights, gloves, etc.); Providing meals (either pre-packaged or or individually served) to hurricane-affected residents at mobile or fixed sites.

• Location: Various, with staging hubs at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, Miller Field in Staten Island and MacArthur Airport in Long Island.
  
• Time needs: Flexible day projects
  
• Registering: Connect online to register for projects.
  

New Jersey

Occupy Sandy is a mutual aid group helping connect residents with and initiate relief, support, rebuilding, and recovery systems in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. Occupy Sandy New Jersey has bases throughout hard-hit regions along the coast as well as inland.

Volunteer needs: needs are extremely diverse, including administrative work like receiving, sorting, and re-packing donations; filling orders of meds and supplies for delivery; communicating with field organizations in need of aid; dispatching groups; and more. Volunteers may also arrive to be dispatched to the field. Select from among projects needing: clean-up work (bleaching, shoveling, raking, bagging garbage); demolition; canvassing and assessments (neighbor check-ins, volunteer organizing, database work); driving supplies and volunteers; receiving, sorting, and redistributing supplies; mold remediation; and much more.

• Location: various
  
• Time needs: Flexible day-long, short-term, and long-term commitments.
• Registering: Explore, register, and contact organizers online
  

Since 1993, Jersey Cares has coordinated volunteer opportunities to address community-identified needs state-wide. In partnership with local nonprofits who identify needs, Jersey Cares implements service projects to provide individuals, families, corporate employees, and community groups with service opportunities ranging from tutoring children to painting new murals in schools to providing disaster relief.

Volunteer needs: because Jersey Cares promotes service opportunities identified by a number of local community partners, needs highlighted on their website are extremely diverse. Search their listings by zip code or by using the keyword “disaster” to uncover an abundance of opportunities. Volunteers should be sure to research or contact the partner organization offering their desired service opportunity to ensure that the opportunity is viable and available. Volunteers are also able to start their own projects using the Jersey Cares network.

• Location: Various
  
• Time needs: Flexible projects
  
• Registering: Connect online to register for projects.