Sierra Service Project

Workforce Development: In June 2023 we launched the Sacramento Sustainability Academy (SSA) 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 are 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, are or were justice-involved, are in or transitioning from foster care, or are engaged with the mental health or substance abuse system. We hosted two eight-week cohorts in the spring and an additional summer cohort, funded by the City of Sacramento. They were paid above minimum wage to honor their time invested in learning and serving the community. In 2024, we temporarily expanded the workforce development program into Rancho Cordova, funded by the City of Rancho Cordova. We offered a single eight-week cohort with seven fellows who learned home repair and volunteer management skills. They completed six home repair projects, and hosted four Days of Service for local youth. In total, we had 42 workforce development fellows across two jobs programs.

Sacramento County Year-Round Programs: SSP hosted 216 year-round volunteers in Sacramento County during Days of Service or Alternative Break sessions. Alternative Break sessions are custom scheduled by group request, and vary from year to year significantly in length and location - all were day only programs this year (not overnight). Our largest Day of Service project was building 1,000' of wood fences for the Dixieanne Clean and Green Alley Project, funded by CalTrans through the City of Sacramento. Crews from Sacramento Regional Conservation Corps and AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps made significant contributions to this project, as well as corporate, school, and church groups. 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 2024 fiscal year, 129 loans were made by 28 users.

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.