MDA Seeks Volunteers For Jerry Lewis Telethon

NEW YORK CITY — The Muscular Dystrophy Association is currently seeking volunteers from throughout metro New York, including NYC-area residents living in southwest Connecticut, to help with one of America’s best-known Labor Day traditions, the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon, set to air September 3 and 4 on some 200 stations nationwide.

Between now and Labor Day, volunteers are needed in many areas, including helping with the local Telethon broadcast on WWOR-TV, Channel 9. “It’s critical that we enlist the support of hundreds of volunteers in Connecticut and millions more across the country,” said Jerry Lewis, MDA National Chairman. “Without volunteer help, we simply won’t be able to do everything that needs to be done to make this year’s Telethon a success for ‘my kids.’ Please get involved.”

Volunteer activities include answering phones, coordinating food and drinks for Telethon workers, helping with pre-Telethon mailings, distribution posters to local businesses, transporting supplies, greeting guests, escorting sponsors, tallying pledge slips, addressing envelopes, videotaping and logging the show, manning a clean-up committee, and much more.

Along with star Jerry Lewis and local station emcees, celebrity volunteers include Telethon anchor Ed McMahon, Entertainment Tonight’s Jann Carl, broadcasting legend Casey Kasem, comedian Norm Crosby, and Cynthia Garrett, host of NBC’s Later.

In addition, volunteers are also needed year-round for a myriad of activities to bolster public support and help MDA reduce administrative expenses. Possible duties include taking tickets, helping with security, arranging food contributions, staffing MDA booths, delivering refreshments to fire fighters during “Fill the Boot” campaigns, visiting people with neuromuscular diseases, becoming a “pen pal,” and coordinating educational mailings. Most volunteers need to be at least 16 years old.

Local businesses can help, too, said Bill Galvin, MDA regional director, by sponsoring portions of the local broadcast of the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon, enhancing contributions with “matching minute” Telethon segments, or working with MDA staff to create a telethon-related special event.

MDA is a national voluntary health agency dedicated to finding treatments and cures for more than 40 neuromuscular diseases affecting more than a million Americans. The Association receives no government grants, nor does it seek fees from the families it serves. MDA is the first voluntary health agency to be honored with the American Medical Association Lifetime Achievement Award “for significant and lasting contributions to the health and welfare of humanity.”

For information or to volunteer, call the MDA offices in New York City at 212/679-6244 or North Haven at 203/985-4400, or MDA National Headquarters at 800/572-1717. Information about MDA programs and research advances is also available on MDA’s Web site at www.mdausa.org.