When the teams are at the schools, they perform community service consisting of:
During the program, each member is required to perform 1360 hours of community service. This can include time spent developing the volunteer community service projects which are part of their terms of membership. This can also include work on furthering food security in Santa Cruz, especially post-disaster food security. However, the bulk of these hours will be logged in schools and at the Homeless Garden.
The program will be funded from the Corporation for National Service ($295,749), the Homeless Garden ($32,136), the Heron Foundation ($20,000), the City of Santa Cruz ($25,000) and the Packard Foundation.
Members will receive a stipend equal to the prevailing minimum wage plus medical benefits. In addition, at the end of a full year's service, each Member will be entitled to an Education Grant of $4725.00, to be used for almost any educational cost. Child care allowances are also available.
During the course of the year, Members will spend 20% of their time in training. Topics covered will include:
Training will be planned by the Leadership Committee and conducted by members of the CLASP organizations, volunteers from within the local community, and professional instructors under contract to the Corporation for National Service.
Paid staff will consist of Don Weiss, Program Director (full-time), a Deputy Program Director (part-time), and Rob Mullen, Service Coordinator (part-time). Don brings to the program extensive experience in government, education and small business. Rob is a current AmeriCorps Member just finishing his second year of service. He brings not only his experience with AmeriCorps but tremendous enthusiasm which will inspire our Members as he pursues his primary responsibility of coordinating the teams' service at their home and school gardens. Rob will also act as ADA advisor.
The paid staff will be supported by staff of the CLASP organizations that make up our support network. Agricultural training will be planned and conducted by the staff of the Homeless Garden, the UCSC Agroecology Farm and Garden, and the UCSC Arboretum. Mentoring and other specialized training will generally be provided by technical providers under contract to the Corporation for National Service, the umbrella for the national AmeriCorps. Additional training and supervision of certain activities will be supervised by volunteers from our CLASP partners and the local community. For instance, Dr. Allan Bayer, a psychiatrist, and Rev. Paul Pfotenhauer, an experienced family counselor, will supervise mentoring component of the program.
| Recruitment | August 29 through September 19 |
| Interviews | September 22 through 26 |
| Pre-enrollment medical and background checks | September 29 through October 5 |
| Start Date | October 15 |
| Start-up training | October 15 through 29 |
| Start of service | October 30 |
| End of service | October 10, 1998 |
The Santa Cruz Service Corps is organized as a project of United Services Agency, Inc. a California not-for-profit corporation with 501(c)(3) status under IRS rules. The Corps is organized by the CLASP concept, required of all California AmeriCorps programs. CLASP means California Local Area Service Partnership. Our CLASP consists of:
| Basic Information | Prospectus | History of our program | "The Moral Equivalent of War" |