The Sierra Service Project

Summer Program: The summer program provided service-learning experiences for 546 youth, young adult, and adult volunteers, and employed 23 young adult staff. In three partner communities, 510 overnight volunteers participated in week-long sessions throughout the Western United States. Our site in Sacramento was partially funded by the City of Rancho Cordova, which required secular program content (a first for SSP). In addition to overnight volunteers at this site, we also hosted 36 local Day of Service volunteers who contributed 500 volunteer days over seven weeks. Across all summer sites, volunteers completed 26 critical home repair projects including accessibility ramps, sets of stairs, wood storage sheds, and other projects that improve the safety and livability of homes for lower-income residents. They also worked with 16 community partners including investing time at 7 community gardens. In Del Norte County, volunteers spent one day a week volunteering as a full group with the Tolowa Dunes Stewards doing invasive species removal and environmental restoration, and another day clearing trails with the Redwood National and State Parks.

Year-Round Programs: All of SSP's Days of Service took place in Sacramento County, and Alternative Break sessions took place in both Sacramento and San Diego Counties. SSP hosted 60 Day of Service volunteers, and three Alternative Break sessions with 47 volunteers from high school and college groups. These sessions are custom scheduled by group request, and vary from year to year significantly in length and location. This year we offered both day only and overnight Alternative Breaks. Many year-round volunteers completed projects at We Force Inc. Eco Housing's Safe Harbor, a community of tiny homes which provide transitional housing for families. SSP installed a community garden in the fall of 2022 and has continued to support developing and maintaining the garden since. The North Sacramento Free Tool Library continued to offer over 100 tools to our neighbors in the community to borrow for free including power tools, wheelbarrows, stick tools, tables, and chairs. During the 2023 fiscal year, 388 loans were made by 15 users. SSP has three weekly volunteers who spend each Wednesday morning volunteering for SSP wherever the need is greatest. This year weekly volunteers spent most weeks completing repairing tools, working in the warehouse, and completing projects in the community like at Say Yes 2 Kollege. For the second year, SSP hosted an NCCC (National Civilian Community Corps) AmeriCorps team of 9 young adult volunteers 1.5 days a week, for 12 weeks. NCCC volunteers were critical in helping prepare materials for the summer program, rebalance tools and kitchen equipment in the trailers, hosting the Tool Library's First Birthday, and spent many days establishing Safe Harbor's community garden.

Sacramento Sustainability Academy (SSA): In June 2023 we launched the Sacramento Sustainability Academy, a workforce development jobs program designed to provide young people an introduction to climate action and community resilience work. Building on SSP's history of providing youth and young adults with hands-on experience with tools, home repairs, and high impact community projects, the Academy is focused on energy efficiency through the lens of building science, urban agriculture as a tool for achieving food security/sovereignty through permaculture design principles, and manufacturing design skills to provide young people high demand and cutting edge skills for high paying professions. All program fellows were required to reside within the city limits of Sacramento, and meet additional requirements. Priority was given to individuals who have difficulty finding employment, are low-income, are unemployed and/or out of school, were justice-involved, are in or transitioning from foster care, or are engaged with the mental health or substance abuse system. We hosted two 8-week cohorts funded by the City of Sacramento, one during the summer and one in the fall. 12 youth and young adults graduated from the program in the summer, and 16 young adults started in the fall cohort (graduated in the 2024 fiscal year). They were paid above minimum wage to honor their time invested in learning and serving the community.

These expenses are a combination of general program costs, which are not able to be broken out into the different program categories, as well as smaller programs we run.