As temperatures rise, so does the threat of forest fires. Read about how Civicorps is helping to protect Oakland from forest fires!
Bay Area Braces for Heat Wave; Fire Crews Wary
October 1, 2014
by Rick Hurd
Published by the Contra Costa Times
Photos: Volunteers, East Bay Civicorps, and Caltrans team up to manage dry vegetation in Oakland Hills
October 1, 2014
MercuryNews.com
Our Truck Drivers
Civicorp’s Organic Waste Collection & Job Training Program to Expand
September 30, 2014
By Mallory Pickett on Oakland North
An Oakland North reporter drove around with Civicorps Recycling Interns, Will Montolla and Fua Fatai, as they drove Civicorp’s organic waste collection route.
Get a behind the scenes look at a typical day for our truck drivers!
You may be amazed at what you read:
“Eight hours and over 100 stops later, Montolla and Fatai return to the warehouse. It’s 1:30 pm, but neither of them plans to rest. After work Montolla picks up his five-year-old son from school and they spend the afternoon together. Fatai is studying math at Merritt College, but today there’s no class, so he plays basketball with some friends. They will be back tomorrow at 5 am, and again on Saturday.”
More details about our landmark organics contract in this SF Gate article.
This week, Civicorps was granted a landmark contract by the Oakland City Council in partnership with Waste Management and EBMUD. Staring July 1, 2015, Civicorps will collect up to 70 tons/day of organics from 1,400 restaurants, cafes and food service establishments in the City of Oakland with its Class B driver-trainees.
Civicorps will deliver the materials to EBMUD to be converted in to electricity through their anaerobic digester. It will also generate 8 new internships in truck driving, creating pathways out of poverty for Oakland families.
In addition, in partnership with Teamsters Local 70, Civicorps will run a Truck Driving Pre-Apprenticeship Program for these eight new interns that will directly lead into a Teamsters Apprenticeship. Once in the Teamsters Apprenticeship, Civicorps drivers will enter the union as apprentices. Upon completion of the program they will be eligible for Teamster jobs. This will create a direct pathway from our training program to high-paying union jobs.
Read More about this new partnership in the Oakland Post article.
Published on KTVU.com on December 30, 2013 by Tom Vacar
William Montoya and Fua Fatai, clients of Oakland’s Civicorps, are learning the skills needed to recycle restaurant wastes.
The food waste they collect in Oakland, currently being composted, will soon go to the Eastbay Municipal Utilities District (MUD) Oakland sewage treatment plant.
“We realized we can recycle these kinds of new urban wastes and do it in a way that provides us with renewable energy at the same time,” says Andrea Pook, Eastbay MUD Spokeswoman.
When those food scraps are digested, the methane gas that comes out of them goes into a turbine which can create enough power for 2500 homes.
“At the same time, we develop a product called bio-solid which is the digested solid material that’s used for agricultural fertilizer as well as alternative cover at landfills,” said Jackie Kepke, Eastbay MUD’s Environmental Services Manager.
For Montoya and Fatai, it’s nothing less than life changing.
“I see this as a stepping stone, you know, and just opening up doors for me in the future. It’s exciting to know that I’m part of something big,” said Fatai.
“This program actually saved me from doing a lot of bad stuff. I focus on my future, my family, my son,” Montoya said.
Civicorps’ Bruce Groulx is proud of this program and these men.
“We take society’s waste, recycle it, as well as recycle young people’s lives,” he said.
They are lives ultimately recycled by the clients’ own self-worth.
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WATCH the news cast:
LISTEN to our interview with KGO radio:
Justice Work Of Our Time
Published on EdSource by Kathryn Baron on October 7th, 2013
Not a single student at one of Oakland’s public high schools has to be there. They all arrive by choice – willingly, happily, sometimes desperately – at Civicorps Academy, a charter school for young adults who have aged out of traditional high school but aren’t too old to want another crack at earning a high school diploma.
“People tell me, ‘You’re getting a diploma? (You’re) 22.’ I am,” Tyneisha Crooks said she tells her incredulous inquirers. “There are people older than me getting (a diploma) and I commend them for that; that’s a big step. You got to start from the bottom to get on top and that’s what I’m doing.”
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Published in the Oakland Tribune by Scott Johnson on April 4, 2013
An intimate look at how the loss of almost 40 friends and family to gun violence has impacted a Civicorps student and how our school is helping to transform his life.
“I think that if all of my family was still here, I would have had my high school diploma already,” Marquis Jones, Civicorps student, said. “This is what I have to get done, not just for me but for the rest of my family.”
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