The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced 18 organizations, spread across 11 states, have won $3.5 million of funding through the Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training (EWDJT) program.
The grant program, which began in 1998, has awarded more than $54 million and seen approximately 14,700 individuals receive environmental job training that allows them to address issues in their communities. Roughly 72 percent of those individuals have gone on to full-time environmental jobs, receiving an average starting hourly wage of $14.34. Past graduates have worked on cleanup projects to address the 2010 BP oil spill, the World Trade Center, Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Sandy.
“EWDJT grants transform lives by providing individuals the opportunity to gain meaningful long-term employment and a livable wage in the growing environmental field,” EPA Office of Land and Emergency Management Assistant Administrator Mathy Stanislaus said. “Individuals completing training have often overcome a variety of barriers to employment.”
Stanislaus unveiled this year’s grantees at a training session for the Los Angeles Conservation Corps (LACC), a grant winner that has previously provided training to 460 students, 80 percent of whom went on to environmental jobs.
Other winners come from Maryland, New York, New Orleans, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Connecticut, Washington, California, Missouri, Alabama and Alaska.
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