Volunteer San Diego

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Court-Ordered Volunteering

If you have court-ordered community service hours to complete, you may be able to find opportunities through Volunteer San Diego.

Step 1: Register
To sign up for projects or get contact information on opportunities, you must first be registered on this site.

PLEASE NOTE: Individuals who have been convicted of or charged with any crime involving or relating to child abuse or neglect, child pornography, child abduction, or any other violent offense, including kidnapping, rape or any sexual offense, or who have ever been ordered by a court to receive psychiatric or psychological treatment in connection with such crime or crimes are NOT permitted to register on this site.

Step 2: Notify Us
By law, you must notify any organization you wish to volunteer for that you have court-ordered community service hours to complete and provide information on the nature of your offense. To notify Volunteer San Diego, please email volunteer1@volunteersandiego.org and include your full name, the number of hours you need to serve and your offense.

Step 3: Find Volunteer Opportunities
There are two ways to find volunteer opportunities where court-ordered volunteers are permitted. Please note – you MUST notify each organization of your offense and the number of hours you need to complete.

From the Search Projects Page

Select "Display More Options"
Check the box to "Show activities that are permissible for court-ordered volunteers"
Enter any additional search criteria
Click "Search"

From the Project Calendar Page

You will have the option to "Filter by Project Attributes"
Select "Court Referred Allowed"

Step 4: Have Agency Contact Me / Sign Up
Depending upon the type of project you select, you will be given the choice to:

Sign Up – you will be automatically signed up for that project and will receive a confirmation email containing all of the information you will need
Have Agency Contact Me – the agency will contact you directly with further information about the opportunity and how to sign up. An automatic email will also be sent to you, with contact information for the agency, so that you can follow up with them if you do not get a response
Flexible Volunteer Program – certain projects may tell you that you need to attend an orientation – these projects are part of our Flexible Volunteer Program. If your offense is NOT any of those listed in red above, several Flex Projects may be open to you. Learn more about Flex

Step 5: Verify Hours
Whenever you attend a project, we strongly recommend that you get an agency official to verify the hours you have served at the end of the project. It is often difficult to get verification of hours at a later date.

Please note – Volunteer San Diego is not able to verify any hours for projects that are not managed by us. If you have signed up to attend a Volunteer San Diego project, we can provide you with a community service log to help verify and track your hours.

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