"national service programs will be our own stress test to see if we can handle the growth of The Serve America Act" - Public Allies CEO Paul Schmitz

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Stimulus Dollars Provide Welcome Lift and New Service Recruits to Lend a Hand

By Caroline Preston

Seven new AmeriCorps participants will help a local United Way in South Carolina get the word out about adult-literacy services. Habitat for Humanity International expects to get 30 percent more helpers it will put to work transforming its mission from building new homes to weatherizing and rehabilitating older buildings. And in St. Louis, a settlement house will match local housing and community groups with 15 additional volunteers, many of whom come from low-income neighborhoods like the ones where the charities work.

Those are just a few of the ways in which the federal stimulus package is giving a lift to organizations that rely on assistance from government volunteerism programs.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provided $201-million to the Corporation for National and Community Service, the agency that runs the federal AmeriCorps program. So far, the corporation has awarded $29-million of the $89-million appropriated for state and national AmeriCorps programs, and the $65-million allocated for AmeriCorps Vista, a similar effort focused on reducing poverty. (The rest of the money is for participants' education stipends and the corporation's technology and administrative costs.)

The corporation expects to distribute the remainder of the money by mid-May, says Kristin McSwain, chief of program operations for the agency. The first infusion of AmeriCorps support was delivered through states according to a formula determined by their populations, while the second portion will be awarded through a competitive grants process at the state and national level.

Altogether, that will mean 13,000 extra volunteers, the first 100 of whom started serving at the end of April. AmeriCorps participants work with a nonprofit group for up to a year.

Nationwide, there has been no dearth of interest in the spots. Thanks to President Obama's emphasis on community service and the abysmal job market, the Corporation for National and Community Service has received 48,500 applications online since November, a 234-percent increase over the same period the previous year.

Charities that have won or expect to receive additional volunteers and money are thrilled, saying they will be able to expand and strengthen programs, respond to needs exacerbated by the recession, and instill a passion for service in more Americans.

An added benefit of the stimulus program is that charities can win an exception from the usual requirement that they match the money the government provides for each AmeriCorps member, either waiving it altogether or reducing the match amount required.

'Stress Test'

Nonprofit leaders say the additional help provides a welcome dress rehearsal for the Serve America Act, legislation signed in April that calls for tripling AmeriCorps by 2017. But they also emphasize just how challenging it has been to identify the right opportunities for the new volunteers given how little time they have had to prepare. Vetting applicants and matching them with organizations will also be a significant undertaking.

"This is the stress test for national-service programs," said Paul Schmitz, chief executive of Public Allies, a Milwaukee group that places young people with charities around the country. "If the service field can put these people to work quickly to achieve outcomes for communities, it's going to demonstrate we are really ready for the growth curve the Serve America Act gives us."

Mr. Schmitz anticipates his group will get between 100 and 200 additional volunteers — up to a 50-percent increase.

One consequence of the pressure to get the stimulus money out to nonprofit groups quickly has been that most of it is going to previous AmeriCorps beneficiaries.

Timothy Ervolina, president of the South Carolina Commission on National and Community Service, which oversees AmeriCorps programs in the state, says he would have liked to encourage more charities to come up with proposals but had only a month for the process.

Still, nonprofit groups say they have been able to identify ways to maximize the benefits from this infusion of new help.

Although it hasn't received final word, Habitat for Humanity International anticipates training its share of the new national-service participants at its headquarters in how to weatherize and repair buildings and then send the volunteers to local chapters where they can introduce the skills to others.

"They really are the vanguard," says Mark Andrews, senior director of U.S. operations. "Many of our affiliates have raised their hands and said, We need to do this work but we need some additional expertise, and the Vista program fits perfectly with that."

Nonprofit officials say they are looking at the additional service members as a temporary infusion of talent, not something they can count on in the future. But groups that take advantage of the new volunteers could also benefit from the expansion in national-service programs called for in the Serve America Act.

"We've been very clear with folks that the recovery act is one-time money," says Ms. McSwain, of the Corporation for National and Community Service. "That said, it's also very clear looking at the president's budget that there will be opportunities for more funding."