The following is an excerpt pulled from The Vicksburg Post’s archives. The article originally appeared in the the Nov. 9, 2008 edition of The Vicksburg Post. Subscribers have full access to The Post’s archives. For more information on how to access them or to sign up for a subscription, click here. 

Check out this article from The Vicksburg Post archives to find out how AmeriCorps came to have a campus in the River City.

————————————-

Service organization campus will be fifth in United States
By Megan Holland

The 100-year-old All Saints’ Episcopal School closed its doors as a religious boarding school in 2006 but a new crop of young people will call it home within a year.

The Episcopal diocese of Mississippi, which co-owns the school with the Episcopal dioceses of Louisiana, Arkansas and Western Louisiana, has leased the 40-acre complex to AmeriCorps, a government service program.

“This is the result of a lot of work that was done with the city government of Vicksburg helping the Diocese to lay the plan for AmeriCorps to come in and use the facility for their volunteers,” said Scott Lenoir, editor of The Mississippi Episcopalian, who added that the first group will live in the former junior high, high school and college campus dorms.

“This is the result of a long process of negotiation that has come to a place where we were able to go ahead with the lease,” he said.

AmeriCorps will lease 75 percent of the All Saints’ property and the dioceses will keep the rest. The dioceses will also continue to fund the maintenance and upkeep of the buildings and grounds.

AmeriCorps will use the facility, which includes office buildings, dormitories, a gymnasium, sports fields and houses, to house trainees for the National Civilian Community Corps program.

AmeriCorps NCCC is a full-time, team-based residential program for men and women ages 18 to 24. The program, which is volunteer-oriented and requires a 10-month commitment, states its mission is to strengthen communities and develop leaders through direct, team-based national and local community service. Trainees partner with nonprofit organizations, state and local agencies and faith-based and other community organizations to help complete service projects.

The Vicksburg campus will be the fifth in the country; the other four are in Denver, Sacramento, Perry Point, Md., and Vinton, Iowa.

“This is a big win for Vicksburg,” said Vicksburg Mayor Lawrence Leyens, “particularly because each volunteer will have to do 80 hours of local volunteer services.

“It is a localized version of the Peace Corps,” he said. “There will be uniformed college kids that will be put into groups of eight to 12 and will go out and do specific projects.

Marsha Meeks Kelly is executive director for the Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service.

She said this is something she has wanted for Mississippi for a long time.

“About seven years ago, I kept thinking we needed an NCCC campus,” said Kelly. “I wrote Congress and visited and started looking around the state for places we could possibly hold the campus, because other campuses are in closed military bases. We looked at several places but that was before the Iraq war, when there were downsized bases and room; there’s no room anymore.

“We have very few facilities that fit the need: a facility that could house about 350 people that was near an airport in case the team had to leave quickly to get to a disaster,” Kelly said. “About that time All Saints’ announced it was closing. It was really serendipity. They had a walk-in ready facility that could accommodate all the needs with room to grow and expand.”

According to the group’s Web site, AmeriCorps this year will offer more than 1,300 individuals the opportunity to learn and provide intensive, results-driven service to meet education, environmental, public safety and other needs in communities across Mississippi.

Within the state, individuals serve through AmeriCorps VISTA, Volunteers in Service to America, whose members help bring individuals and communities out of poverty by serving full-time to fight illiteracy, improve health services, create businesses and increase housing opportunities, and AmeriCorps NCCC.

Since 1994, more than 7,900 Mississippi residents have qualified for AmeriCorps Education Awards totaling more than $31,990,000.

A federal agency oversees volunteer funding across the country. Each state has a commission, and funds flow from the federal level to the commissions. The Mississippi commission was born about 15 years ago and oversees annual funding; part of that funding goes toward AmeriCorps, which has smaller community-run programs in addition to the extensive NCCC program, which is modeled after the Civilian Conservation Corps of the 1930s, and the U.S. military.

About 75 percent of all AmeriCorps grant funding goes to the governor-appointed Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service, which in turn awards grants to nonprofit groups to respond to local needs. Most of the remainder of the grant funding is distributed by AmeriCorps directly to multistate and national organizations through a competitive grants process.

About $2.5 million has been allotted by the government to refurbish the campus, and repairs are expected to begin immediately, Kelly said. It was unknown among local AmeriCorps employees and employees of the dioceses the daily and monthly costs of running the program at All Saints’.

NCCC trainees will be deployed to disaster areas and help with community service projects across the Southeast. According to the group’s Web site, those service projects, which typically last from six to eight weeks, address critical needs in education, public safety, the environment and other focuses.

Members tutor students, construct and rehabilitate low-income housing, respond to natural disasters, clean up streams, help communities develop emergency plans and address other local needs.

When not deployed, teams will attend preparation classes that teach vital skills in helping with disasters as well as community service and will volunteer here in Vicksburg.

Leyens said the city plans to have participants work with the Vicksburg Neighborhood Enhancement Program, a program designed to help repair and maintain homes when owners are not able to do so. There are currently 250 houses on the program’s list.

“This is a huge deal and a real win for the community,” said Leyens. “We’re really happy. The federal government plans to make a big deal and announce it this spring after the new president takes office.”

“Each team of about 10 to 12 will be given a 14-passenger van, and each trainee is given a stipend to live off of,” said Kelly. “The community is going to see a lot of uniformed boots on the ground soon.”

In addition to the stipend, those who serve for a year receive a $4,725 education award for a year of full-time service. The award is prorated for part-time.

The AmeriCorps administrative team is expected to arrive by Jan. 1, and about 80 students will follow in August. About 160 more will arrive in January 2010. The trainees will follow a winter schedule; new groups will arrive each January and will leave at the end of the year, Kelly said, to prevent a change of group members during or near hurricane season.

Locally, smaller organizations for AmeriCorps exist at Beechwood and South Park elementary schools and at Warren Central High School through the Mississippi Department of Education. Another affiliation is at the Vicksburg National Military Park through the Student Conservation Association. All are classified as education awards programs.

About the campus

The All Saints’ campus is on 40 largely secluded acres off Confederate Avenue and just north of North Frontage Road.

It comprises nine buildings, including five dormitories — three formerly used for girls and two for boys.

The oldest building on campus, Green Hall, houses the administrative offices and all classrooms, as well as the dining hall and library.

The campus also includes a chapel and a residence that previously housed the rector, a skateboarding court, a swimming pool, two tennis courts, two soccer fields, a disc golf course, a sand volleyball course and a gym that houses weight equipment, a basketball court and a rock-climbing wall.