September 28, 2006 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Photograph by Mark Von Holden/DMI
People with severe mental illnesses often have trouble finding jobs, especially if they have a history of homelessness and a sketchy employment record. But in New York, they can gain work skills by helping Mother Nature.
The Goddard Riverside Community Center, which provides social services in Manhattan’s Upper West Side and Harlem neighborhoods, trains mentally ill adults to beautify green spaces. It then hires the workers at minimum wage to provide landscaping services to paying customers, including local businesses and housing developments.
The 11-year-old program, known as Green Keepers, gives participants a chance to gain some skills quickly — they are hired after only four days of training — and to build self-confidence by working in a supportive environment.
“A lot of them have been very isolated for long periods,” says Deborah Kaplan, the program director. “They’re not only getting an opportunity to work, but they’re getting to socialize, to be with other people.”
The outdoor work is a comfortable match for some clients who have lived on the streets, Ms. Kaplan says. “There’s something very appealing about the work of planting and working in the earth and being outside.”
Each Green Keeper works about eight to 20 hours a week. Some of the workers get promoted to supervisor positions and earn more money, and about 25 percent graduate from the program to find jobs elsewhere, Ms. Kaplan says.
Goddard Riverside — with a $16-million budget, about 70 percent coming from government contracts — also helps the Green Keepers find housing and develop daily-living skills.
Ms. Kaplan says she expects the horticultural teams will earn approximately $150,000 from their contracts this year. The organization also gets an annual grant of about $20,000 from the Greenacre Foundation, in New York, which gives money to groups that help to “green” public spaces.
Here, Goddard Riverside’s staff horticulturist, Arthur Sheppard (far right), shows some Green Keepers how to plant seedlings in the center’s greenhouse.
