Robin Bondy has helped victims of Hurricane Katrina and 9-11 and rushed to floods, forest fires and an earthquake for the Canadian Red Cross.
The Windsor woman is such a dedicated Red Cross volunteer, she has used her vacation time to head to disasters. And she carries a beeper to be available around the clock all year even though she could join other Red Cross volunteers in sharing beeper duty for local aid such as house fires.
Bondy is receiving the Order of the Red Cross, one of the most prestigious awards from the non-profit humanitarian organization. She was to be presented the medal as a surprise at a volunteer appreciation night Thursday at the Royal Canadian Legion on Marentette Avenue.
“She’s hard-core dedicated,” local Canadian Red Cross disaster management advisor Donna Girard said Thursday.
“We have some dedicated volunteers no doubt. And then, like I said, Robin just goes above and beyond and exceeds all those expectations.”
Bondy has been a Canadian Red Cross volunteer for 20 years. She started volunteering in 1993 and after her training her first volunteer deployment was in 1994 for an earthquake in Los Angeles. Girard said going to help at disasters can mean two to three weeks of volunteer deployment meaning Bondy, a legal secretary, would have to use her vacation. She also takes time to train other volunteers.
“Her caring and compassion not only extends to those who are in need it also extends to the volunteers that we have because she wants them to be as trained. Robin has woken up countless (times) in the middle of the night when the pager goes off,” Girard said. “She doesn’t have to. She’s a volunteer.”
Volunteers on a rotation with a pager are usually only on-call for a few days at a time to assist families at house fires. But Girard said Bondy has her beeper year round. Girard said she’s never been able to get Bondy to even estimate how many volunteer hours she racks up each year. She already has the other awards given to volunteers at the local level.
The last time someone in Windsor received the Order of the Red Cross was in 2009 for volunteer Doreen O’Brien, Girard said.
Windsor-Essex Red Cross has about 60 volunteers but could always use more. Call 519-944-8144 for more information.
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