Volunteers are mobilized throughout Summit County for today's United Way of Summit County Day of Action.

About 1,100 volunteers from several dozen companies will spend the day away from work and instead helping more than 60 nonprofit organizations.

A lot of people associate United Way with fundraising.  After all, the organization does dedicate a lot of time to raising money to supplement dozens of social service agencies in Summit County.  Gaffney, however, says it's important to know that providing volunteers is another way they can help.

"One of the neat things that we've found through Day of Action is people discover a nonprofit that maybe they didn't know much about and they become very enamored of it and then volunteer throughout the rest of the year," said United Way's Michael Gaffney.

Gaffney says the volunteers do whatever is needed, but projects often focus on landscaping, painting or filing. 

United Way of Summit County holds a database to match volunteers in the area with agencies that are looking for extra help.  Gaffney says you can request the type of volunteer work you want to do, the general geographic location and how often you can help and United Way will find a match.