I 

111TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 1363 

To establish the GothamCorps program. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

MARCH 5, 2009 

Mr. WEINER introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 

Committee on Education and Labor 

A BILL 

To establish the GothamCorps program. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘GothamCorps Author5 ization Act of 2009’’. 

6 SEC. 2. GOTHAMCORPS. 

7 (a) PROGRAM ESTABLISHED.—From amounts made 

8 available in the National Service Trust to carry out this 

9 section, the Corporation for National and Community 

10 Service shall carry out a program, to be known as the 

11 GothamCorps program, under which the Corporation 


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1 makes grants to units of local government for use by the 

2 unit of local government to carry out volunteer projects. 

3 (b) SELECTION CRITERIA AND VOLUNTEER BENE4 FITS.—The program shall use the same selection criteria 

5 and provide the same volunteer benefits as under the 

6 AmeriCorps State and National program. 

7 (c) FUNDING.—There are authorized to be appro8 priated to the National Service Trust to carry out this 

9 section $260,000,000 for each fiscal year. 

10 (d) ALLOCATION OF GRANTS.—For each fiscal year, 

11 amounts under the program shall be allocated as follows: 

12 (1) The first $150,000,000 shall be divided 

13 equally into six grants, to be made on a competitive 

14 basis to units of local government with populations 

15 of more than 100,000. 

16 (2) The remaining amounts shall be divided 

17 into other grants as the Corporation considers ap18 propriate, to be made on a competitive basis to units 

19 of local government with populations of not more 

20 than 100,000. 

21 (e) LOCAL FUNDING.—A unit of local government 

22 shall provide to each participant in the volunteer project, 

23 in addition to the benefit provided to the participant from 

24 grant funds, an amount equal to the cost of one year’s 

25 tuition at a local public college. Amounts so provided may 


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1 be derived from the unit of local government itself or from 

2 third-party funds. 

3 (f) FOCUS.—A unit of local government shall des4 ignate an issue of primary focus for the volunteer project 

5 and shall dedicate the efforts of the project to addressing 

6 that issue. 

7 (g) NON-DISPLACEMENT.—A unit of local govern8 ment shall ensure that the participants in the project do 

9 not perform jobs that would otherwise be performed by 

10 full-time employees. 

11 (h) ADMINISTRATION.—A unit of local government 

12 may use one or more outside persons or entities to admin13 ister the volunteer project. In such a case, the unit of local 

14 government shall designate a single person to serve as the 

15 head of administration. 

16 (i) ADMINISTRATIVE COSTS.—The grant amounts 

17 provided under the program shall include amounts to pro18 vide benefits to participants and amounts for the adminis19 tration of the volunteer project. 

20 (j) ACCOUNTABILITY.—A unit of local government 

21 shall institute explicit, measurable goals for assessing 

22 whether the volunteer project is successful. 

23 (k) SCHOLARSHIP LIMITATION.—Scholarships to in24 stitutions of higher education to which the unit of local 


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1 government does not contribute funds shall not exceed 50 

2 percent of the scholarship funds disbursed in a given year. 

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