April has been designated as “national volunteer month,” and each year the Town of Fountain Hills takes the opportunity to host a large reception honoring its many volunteers.

The theme of “We hit the jackpot with our volunteers” permeated the Community Center reception April 3 organized by Heather Ware, the town’s volunteer coordinator.

More than 800 Foun-tain Hills volunteers do-nated their time to the town by giving approxi-mately 18,000 hours in 2012 to the Community Center, the John O’Flynn Senior Activity Center and the Municipal Court.

Volunteers also helped out in various depart-ments – administration, development services and community services.

Nationally, more than 120 million volunteers contribute their time and talents daily to make a real difference in the lives of others.

Named as “volunteer of the year” for 2012-13 was Gene Slechta, who also was the top volunteer for the Development Services Department.

Slechta put in a stint as a town employee and then “retired” for good, volun-teering for the Give A Lift program, Home Delivered Meals and coordinating a worksite project for Make a Difference Day.

He is currently serving his second term on the Planning and Zoning Commission and helped with the Arizona Centen-nial Committee and the town’s sign ordinance subcommittee.

Craig Rudolphy, the 2011-12 volunteer of the year, was honored with the Presidential Volun-teer Service Award.

This is a national award given in recognition of superior volunteer service. Rudolphy has sustained a commitment to civic participation through service to the town by contributing more than 800 hours of volunteer service annual-ly.

For more than 40 years he served as a certified public accountant, chief financial officer, controller and volunteer with a variety of organizations and entities.

Today he assists the town’s Finance Depart-ment in a variety of ways, typically putting in 20 hours a week of volunteer service – and still sporting a shirt and tie.

Outstanding volunteers recognized with Home De-livered Meals were Pat Covault and Peg O’Hara (22 years of service), Pat Wisnefski and Winnie Swoffer (20 years), Joanne Roza (15 years) and Marti Lemieux (program founder).

Other outstanding vol-unteers recognized were Dale Houmes, Senior Ser-vices; Nick Coverdale, Parks & Recreation; Ken Burling, Community Cen-ter; and Nelda Flygare, Administration.

Mayor Linda Kavanagh introduced her Mayor’s Youth Council, a group of teens dedicated to better-ing Fountain Hills by cre-ating programs that ap-peal to high school stu-dents and volunteering at various events, such as the Turkey Trot and oth-ers.

Mike Ciccarone, IT coordinator, also recognized Karl Noss for his volunteer efforts at Town Hall with technology-related projects.