Job Hunting with Jobina: Urban Tilth hiring youth in Richmond

Urban Tilth is a non-profit organization based in Richmond and run by mostly Richmond residents. The team turns vacant lots into beautiful spaces and runs several community gardens, as well as an urban farm that feeds 400 families a week through a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program.

"We do that work by hiring and training local residents to actually be the change they want to see in the world," Doria Robinson, the executive director of Urban Tilth, said. "We train people to grow food, we train people to design and install gardens, we train

people to teach youth and teach kids."

Robinson needs to hire a bookkeeper. That job is pretty self-explanatory. However, she's also advertising the Summer Youth Apprentice Program for 14 to 18-year-olds.

"We hire 40 youth to help us do this work," Robinson said. "It's 6-weeks long, there's a $1,000 stipend and all youth are welcome."

Applications for the program are open now.

"You're in a big cohort," Robinson said. "You learn a lot of things and it's kind of a transformative summer."

Robinson told ABC7 News that program participants have gone on to be permanent staff members. She'll be recruiting for Urban Tilth's Basins of Relations Watershed restoration program in the fall. She noted that CSA drivers and short-term positions, like instructors at youth program sites, are often needed too.

"They'll be teaching about food justice and they'll be teaching about food access and kind of the history of food in our community."

If you are interested in transforming the environment and inspiring people towards health, Urban Tilth is interested in you.

"I grew up in Richmond during the 80s, 70s and 80s, and it was hard," Robinson said. "There weren't places for me where I was growing up to be outside where I was safe. I wasn't even beginning to think about things like my body, health and things like that. We had tons of vacant lots and we did the most with them, kind of played and did our thing, but we could have done so much more if there were older people out at that time creating spaces for us to spread out, be safe, and bloom. I feel like that's the work that Urban Tilth is doing."

THURSDAY'S FEATURED JOB:

Company: Urban Tilth

Job: Summer Youth Apprentice Program

Pay: $1,000 stipend

Visit UrbanTilth.org to apply