Clearinghouse volunteers excel in organized chaos
By Kathryn Bender, Star-Bulletin
Volunteers from the West Pearl Harbor Rotary Club speedily organize Thanksgiving baskets at the Community Clearinghouse for some of the thousands of families seeking help.

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The busy facility helps the less fortunate

By Susan Kreifels
Star-Bulletin

Mariellen Byrnes-Jones, five months pregnant and sucking a lollipop, directs the chaos inside the warehouse on Kapalama Military Reservation like a big-hearted general.

Four telephones on her desk ring constantly. The warehouse, parts of its ceiling hanging precariously, is chock-full of diapers and old TVs, hospital gowns and pumpkin-pie filling. Boxes in the cramped 6,000-square-foot building are stored right up to the bathroom stalls.

"Welcome to my nightmare," says a smiling Byrnes-Jones, director of the Community Clearinghouse.

As she says this, 60 volunteers scurry everywhere stacking dishes and folding sheets. Members of the West Pearl Harbor Rotary pack 165 boxes of Thanksgiving food. Kamehameha Schools seniors Danielle Potter and Kalani Handley file stacks of requests for help from Hawaii's poor.

Most everything that comes into this warehouse is given away quickly, except for the single typewriter in Byrnes-Jones' cage-like office: "For Clearinghouse Staff Only - Not to Be Given Away" reads the paper taped to it.

The Clearinghouse, a program of Helping Hands Hawaii and funded through Aloha United Way, distributes donated goods to people referred by 625 local organizations that work with the poor.

Normally the Clearinghouse gets 275 to 300 requests a day for help. During holidays, that rises to around 600, and from October through December, it's pretty much seven days a week, 24 hours a day.

In August, a slow month, the Clearinghouse gave away 408,789 pounds of supplies.

She expects 10 times that amount during the holidays.

Byrnes-Jones is worried that higher demands this holiday season will be difficult to meet.

Nonprofit organizations are overloaded with requests for help due to welfare cutbacks and a stale economy here.

Last year Byrnes-Jones helped 200,000 families through the holidays and she expects more this season. Back-to-school help for students this year increased dramatically - 13,700 requests compared to 3,572 in 1996.

The Clearinghouse especially needs kitchenware now.

"People don't mind waiting for TVs but when they are eating with their hands and washing paper cups, they can't wait," Byrnes-Jones said.

And she always needs volunteers, especially now, to supplement the 275 regular volunteers and two full-time workers. Byrnes-Jones has no computers and everything is recorded by hand.

About half the volunteers are working people who come in during time off. Another quarter are retired senior citizens and the rest come from various rehabilitation, disability, prison and community service programs.

Eseta Ulu, 28, has been volunteering at the Clearinghouse for almost 10 years, two days a week. On Wednesday during the holidays she often stays until 5 a.m., packing the 64 baby layettes prepared for new mothers every week. "It's for the people, for the children especially," Ulu said. "A lot of people need help."

March Malaeulu, a social worker with the Honolulu Community Action Program, Kalihi District, brought 11 volunteers with her one night last week - family, friends and church members. She also helps two days a week.

"They help my clients," said Malaeulu, one of many social workers who volunteer to show their appreciation.

Byrnes-Jones has seen some unusual things come through the Clearinghouse - condoms, "pasties" worn by bar dancers, and half-finished animals stuffed by taxidermists.

Still, the Clearinghouse prides itself on recycling almost anything into an item that looks nice and works. For example, volunteers take home dolls to wash their hair, repaint their faces and dress in homemade clothes.

When the Clearinghouse needed baby blankets, they found that cut-up hospital gowns, trimmed and decorated, made excellent ones. "Thousands of gowns are now on the backs of babies who need them," she said.

Byrnes-Jones makes sure that what is given away looks nice. "We are dealing with people's emotions as well," she said.

Good Neighbor Fund aids people during holidays

The Honolulu Star-Bulletin's annual Good Neighbor Fund drive begins today. If you can help, checks may be sent to c/o the Good Neighbor Fund, P.O. Box 2019, Aiea, Hawaii 96701.