Helping Hand

Comal Master Gardener Helping Hand Program

At its April 2022 meeting, the CMG Executive Board (EB) approved a trial program to assist Comal County residents by providing one-on-one advice on gardening problems and issues.
Background: Over the last three months, CMG has received six requests for members to provide on-site home visits and assist the residents with various gardening/ landscaping issues.  These requests come into the Ask-A-Master-Gardener (AAMG) program or the CMG website with the majority coming from individuals who recently moved to Comal County from out of state or from distant parts of Texas.
Program Goal:  The goal of the program is to provide one-on-one gardening advice to county residents or residents-to-be and not to engage/assist in gardening work.
 Program Parameters: The EB approved the following parameters for the program.

• CMG certified members will be informed about the program and asked if they would like to participate.
• Members opting to participate will be added to the Helping Hand email distribution list.
• As requests come in to AAMG and the website for assistance, the request will be forwarded to members on the distribution list and posted on the CMG website. The requestor will be notified that their request has been sent to CMG members and they will be contacted within 10 days if volunteers are available to help them.
• Members who volunteer will respond to AAMG and the website letting them know they will fulfill the request and then email the requestor introducing themselves and scheduling a meeting. The website will annotate the posted request that it has been fulfilled.
• Further interaction with the requestor will be solely up to the volunteer.
• Volunteer members will receive credit for travel time and time spent advising county residents by entering hours in VMS under Outreach. If volunteers decide to assist a resident with gardening work, those hours are not eligible for volunteer hour credit.
• The volunteer will inform the website once a request is completed and no more interaction with the requestor is anticipated.

A summary of visit requests by date follows.