At the Santa Barbara Foundation, our team is committed to community – and that goes beyond our work with SBF. As we reflect on all that we are grateful for, we’d like to recognize a few members of our SBF family who go above and beyond to serve their communities through volunteer commitment. Learn how our team chooses to give back, and why volunteerism is so important to us!
Rubayi Estes, Vice President, Programs
Organization: Planned Parenthood California Central Coast (PPCCC)
Role: Board Member
Why do you give back? “It always has been important to me – I went to school in an Ashram for 11 years, and we understood that volunteering is why we are here.”
Special memory: “At Pride festival a few years back I got to table with Planned Parenthood California Central Coast staff and volunteers. I learned so much about their journeys while we did education and outreach with young people at the festival on sexual health and wellness. It was very rewarding.”
Stacie Furia, Learning and Evaluation Manager
Organization: PEP (Postpartum Education for Parents)
Role: Board Member
Why do you give back? “Making the world a happier and friendlier place for everyone is central to my belief systems. I recognize that I have a lot of privilege and so a part of how I acknowledge that is to give back in as many ways as I can.”
Special memory: “I love volunteering with my kids. Whenever we go to the school to do work on the garden or the classrooms, it’s fun to talk about why we’re there and then it’s so fun to see how proud they are of the work they do. Recently, my 5-year-old and I helped fix the fencing on the side of the hill by the playground. Afterward, he got to tell all his friends that they could play on the hill again because of the work he helped do. He was so proud!”
Jordan Killebrew, Director of Communications
Organization: Project IV Love & Juneteenth Santa Barbara
Role: Co-Founder
Why do you give back? I have a rule: share a smile. You never know another person’s journey, and giving back – even something as simple as a smile or a hello – can bring joy to another, and spreading joy is infectious.
Special memory: “When we launched the Love + Remembrance Garden in Isla Vista after a year of fundraising and helping the community heal. Our core committee looked at each other tears in our eyes and knew we did right by the six Gauchos who lost their lives. ‘We built a park,’ we said, ‘we built a park.'”
Jamie Perez, Community Engagement Coordinator
Organization: Church’s Awana Group
Role: Community Volunteer
Why do you give back? “I think it is important to be connected to something bigger than yourself, taking care of the environment and caring for people. In my life I’ve been so blessed, so why not pay it forward.”
Special memory: “At my previous job, I was one of the founding members of MB CARES, our workplace volunteer group; we organized annual events including beach clean-ups, food drive, and card signing for military service-members.”
Stephanie Roberson, Operations Manager
Organization: Santa Barbara Bicycle Coalition + The Coalition for Sustainable Transportation’s (SBBIKE+COAST)
Role: Advisory Committee Member
Why do you give back? “To me there’s no better way to invest yourself in your community and truly be able to call it your home than to spend time and talent working to make a positive change to the place you love. I know that what I am doing has a positive impact for someone.”
Special memory: “There is one resident of Mariposa I take out for regular rides with Cycling Without Age named Dorothy. I will never forget the first time she went out for a ride with me. We sang show tunes at the top of our lungs as we zoomed down the streets of Goleta. But Dorothy’s FAVORITE song that day was Somewhere Over the Rainbow. We sang it over and over again as we took in the sights, watched kids play baseball and biked through the neighborhoods. Neither of us wanted that ride to end.”
Janet Mocker, Senior Director of Finance
Organization: Live Oak Unitarian Universalist Congregation
Role: Bookkeeper
Why do you give back? “I learned of a need right here in my neighborhood for something I knew how to do, and at the time I hadn’t yet found an accounting job in the Santa Barbara area and was heartsick not to be working in my chosen profession. A few months after I offered to do the job as a volunteer, I was hired as accounting manager at SBF, but I continued volunteering. LOUUC bookkeeping is much less complex than SBF finance/accounting, so it is therapeutic and I am helping good people who care a lot about social justice.”
Special memory: “Receiving checks to Live Oak with “gratitude” in the memo field and personal unsecured loans from members and friends so the organization could pay off its mortgage. That is real love and commitment!”
Caleb Stumberg, Data Administrator
Organization: Channel Islands Restoration
Role: Seasonal Restoration Volunteer
Why do you give back? “I want to know the community we are working for at SBF, and I want to see the nonprofit work that is happening throughout the county.”
Special memory: “I went on a backcountry volunteer trip into the Upper Santa Ynez River Valley with the Channel Islands Restoration. We spent 5 days removing invasive Tamarisk Trees, which are big water drinkers and kill native plants. The work was hard, but the country was incredible and the people were amazing!”
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