Region
Volunteer Opportunities in La Pine, Oregon
Matching organizations, in a different order on every visit
Connect Central Oregon is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that strengthens communities in Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson counties (plus Warm Springs) by connecting people with volunteer opportunities, board positions, and mentorship. It promotes civic engagement, community leadership, and innovation through platforms like Central Oregon Volunteer Connect.
Volunteers help run CCO's community events, from volunteer and board fairs to robotics and drone expositions, support community media production, and help keep the Volunteer Central Oregon directory accurate by reviewing organization listings. Students and groups are welcome, and CCO can sign off on community service hours.
Central Oregon Volunteer Connect
also known as COVC, Volunteer Connect, Volunteer Central Oregon
Central Oregon Volunteer Connect is a program of Connect Central Oregon representing one of their four pillars - alongside Mentoring, Innovation, and Partnership. It's a regional infrastructure, shaped and stewarded by community leaders over more than two decades connecting organizations, volunteers, emerging leaders, and community energy across Central Oregon. Along with direct partnership outreach across the region, most notably the Connect Central Oregon Volunteer & Board Fair — the in-person event connecting volunteers and organizations face to face, their Volunteer Central Oregon directory allows browsing or searching to find organizations across Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson Counties, and Warm Springs looking for volunteers, donors, and community partners.
Connect Central Oregon is always looking for leaders who want to help connect individuals, groups, and organizations to each other and strengthen our community. One of the most important roles within the entire organization, serving as a "Connector" represents the very purpose of ConnectCO and serves as the primary method of our community engagement...using very literally every resource ConnectCO and its leadership team have to offer.
SAGE - Senior Advocates for Generational Equity
also known as SAGE
SAGE (Senior Advocates for Generational Equity) helps people over 50 give forward so that younger and future generations can thrive. SAGE members in central Deschutes County volunteer their time and experience with local youth-serving programs and advocate for policies that support children and families.
SAGE offers a range of ways to give forward, including leading or joining discussion groups and workshops, mentoring younger generations, event support, and contributing to special projects. Some opportunities are with SAGE directly, others through partner organizations SAGE promotes in the community.
Think Wild is Central and Eastern Oregon's only public wildlife hospital and conservation center, located on four acres on Bend's east side. Its veterinary staff and volunteers rescue, treat, and release hundreds of injured and orphaned native animals each year, from hummingbirds and flying squirrels to bald eagles and bobcats. Think Wild also runs a wildlife hotline, humane wildlife conflict help, Beaver Works Oregon habitat restoration, and education programs and camps for youth and the community. Found injured or orphaned wildlife? Call the hotline at 541-241-8680 (8am–6pm daily).
Volunteers help in the wildlife hospital with animal care, diet prep, and enclosure upkeep; rescue and transport injured wildlife; care for ambassador animals; support education programs, camps, and community events; and assist with humane wildlife conflict projects. Youth and family volunteering is available for kids and teens, and families and groups can join habitat restoration through Beaver Works Oregon. Training is provided.
La Pine Lions Club
also known as La Pine Lions, La Pine Lions Club Foundation, La Pine Lions Club Inc
Service club for south Deschutes County. La Pine Lions fund eye exams, glasses, and hearing aids for lower-income residents, provide sight and hearing tests in local schools, award scholarships to La Pine High seniors, send a student to diabetes camp, sponsor La Pine's Scout troops, and support local hunger relief through volunteering and the Cascade Lakes Relay.
Members run sight and hearing screenings for La Pine and Sunriver schoolchildren, collect and recycle used eyeglasses and hearing aids, serve at the St. Vincent de Paul food pantry and La Pine Community Kitchen, plant trees and pitch in on Clean-up La Pine Day, and help put on fundraisers like the annual golf tournament. Flags for First Graders visits teach local kids about the flag.
High Desert Robotics & Rotors Expositions
also known as HDRex
High Desert Robotics & Rotors Expositions (HDRex), a program of Connect Central Oregon, inspires the next generation of Central Oregon leaders through hands-on robotics and drone experiences. It organizes expositions, workshops, and competitions, including the region's Aerial Drone Competition for middle and high school pilots and programmers, and connects robotics teams, clubs, schools, mentors, and the wider community.
Founded in 1961, the Humane Society of Central Oregon runs Bend's animal shelter, caring for thousands of abandoned, neglected, and stray companion animals each year and never turning an animal away. Beyond adoptions, HSCO reunites lost pets with their families, offers low-cost spay/neuter and wellness care, runs the HOPE Pet Food Bank to help keep pets in their homes, and brings humane education to schools and community events. Its thrift store helps fund the work.
Volunteers work directly with shelter animals and visitors — grooming and enriching cats through the Feline Friends program, walking and socializing adoptable dogs as Canine Companions, greeting shelter visitors, assisting adoption counselors both on-site and at off-site adoption events, and providing clerical support. Volunteers can start as young as 9 with a guardian.
NatureConnect Central Oregon
also known as Children's Forest of Central Oregon
Formerly the Children's Forest of Central Oregon, NatureConnect unites a network of 30+ public, private, and nonprofit partners to inspire lifelong connections to nature for every child. It focuses on youth and families who face barriers to the outdoors, running culturally specific programs through Vámonos Outside, outdoor school days for rural and Title I students, and paid youth internships and career pathways in natural resources.
Volunteers support outdoor family events and youth programs, help with photography, blog writing, and social media to share the network's stories, and lend a hand with outreach and partner events across the region.
Central Oregon Open Programming
also known as COOP
Central Oregon Open Programming (COOP), a program of Connect Central Oregon, promotes community engagement by amplifying local voices through open programming: community-produced media and content made by and for people across Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson Counties and Warm Springs.
The Bend-La Pine Teen Parent Program helps pregnant and parenting students stay in school and graduate, offering on-site childcare, parenting education, and support so young parents and their children can thrive.
Volunteers help in the program's childcare and early learning rooms, support teen parents with tutoring and mentoring, and collect and organize donated baby supplies.
Honor Flight of Central Oregon
also known as HFCO
Honor Flight of Central Oregon flies local veterans to Washington, D.C., at no cost to them, to visit the memorials built in their honor. Founded in 2018 as one of about 140 hubs in the National Honor Flight Network, it gives priority to World War II, Korea, and Vietnam-era veterans and those with terminal illnesses from Central and Eastern Oregon. Run by volunteers and funded entirely by donations, it has completed eight flights serving more than 200 veterans, each escorted by a volunteer Guardian.
Honor Flight is run entirely by volunteers. More than 200 volunteer Guardians have escorted veterans one-on-one on the trip to Washington, D.C. Others help plan flights, recruit and interview veterans, fundraise and seek sponsors, and turn out for the send-off and welcome-home celebrations at the airport, where community members, groups, and businesses fill the terminal to thank returning veterans.
Big Brothers Big Sisters Of Central Oregon
also known as BBBSCO
Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Oregon (BBBSCO) is a non-profit organization, part of J Bar J Youth Services, that creates one-to-one, life-changing mentoring relationships between adult volunteers ("Bigs") and children ("Littles") ages 6–17. Serving Bend, Redmond, Madras, Prineville, and La Pine, it aims to empower youth through consistent, 2–4 times a month friendship-based activities.
Volunteers ("Bigs") are matched one-to-one with a child ("Little") and commit to spending time together 2–4 times a month for at least a year — sharing activities like sports, hobbies, or just hanging out. Mentors must be 18+ and complete a background check and interview process before being matched.
You haven't seen them all yet. There are more organizations below.