Make Your House a Green House Rising Sun is employing our youth and prolonging our world By Matt Larson In regards to creating jobs in the environmental field, educating youth and the public about how to live more sustainably, and providing retrofit services toward a greener world, Rising Sun Energy Center has set the bar. “We deal with unemployment and combating climate change with one brush stroke,” said Jodi Pincus, Executive Director of Rising Sun Energy Center. “All of our programs have both a social and an environmental mission.” Since their inception in 1994, Rising Sun’s programs and services have made a significant impact on the lives of Bay Area residents. One of the best examples of this is their California Youth Energy Services (CYES) program. Every summer they hire and train youth between the ages of 15 and 22 to go out into their communities and provide residents with a free Green House Call. “Youth come into your home and do an assessment of ways you can save energy and water,” said Pincus. “They look for opportunities for energy and water savings and then they actually install measures that create the savings.” And this is at no-cost to the customer. Such implementations include assessing the toilets for leaks, installing energy-efficient lighting, water-efficient shower heads, providing retractable clotheslines, LED night lights and much, much more. All free. So what’s the catch? Well, we’ve actually already been paying for it. “The utility bill has a public purpose charge on it that goes into a big pot of money to the state to perform energy-efficient projects,” Pincus explains. “We’re one of the subcontractors that are performing the work.” CYES has been growing steadily over the years. In 2000 there was only one site with 15 youth in the City of Berkeley. This year they hired and employed 180 youth and serviced over 5,000 homes in 20 cities. They cover certain areas in Contra Costa, San Joaquin, Alameda, Solano, Marin and Sonoma counties. In west county they are located in Richmond. While this is a free service for the public, it’s an actual paid job for the youth. “We’re very intentional about paying the youth versus having them as interns or volunteers,” Pincus said. “We really believe that 58 MARKETPLACEcontrac osta .com september 2015
Contra Costa Marketplace - Sept 2015
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