TCB Opens the Door to YouthBuild

BOSTON, MA - March 15, 2011: The Community Builders, Inc. (TCB) is pleased to announce the hiring of Steven Ibanez, TCB's first hire from YouthBuild. YouthBuild is a national non-profit youth and community development program that addresses core issues facing low-income communities: housing, education, employment, crime prevention and leadership development.

When you meet Steven you are immediately struck by his ready smile and positive energy. Steven, age 19, was hired from YouthBuild/Just A Start in Cambridge where he graduated from an intensive 10 month construction and educational training program recognized by the National Association of Home Builders.

In YouthBuild programs, low-income young people ages 16-24 work toward their GEDs or high school diplomas, learn job skills and serve their communities by building affordable housing, and transform their own lives and roles in society. There are 273 YouthBuild programs in 45 states with 100,000 YouthBuild students who have built 20,000 units of affordable, increasingly green, housing since 1994. For further information on YouthBuild, visit their website at http://www.youthbuild.org/.

Steven was selected to participate in YouthBuild which requires students to undergo random drug tests, maintain excellent attendance and positive work habits as well as community service in hands on housing rehabilitation project. At YouthBuild, Steven received his own tool belt, a highly coveted award by his field instructors for excellence. He will be putting his tool belt to work at TCB's Franklin Park Apartments and South End Apartments as a Maintenance Technician where he will be helping on unit turnovers to get them ready for future residents. He is very excited about his new job since he will be able to help out his mother, who works at a factory in Chelsea. Steven’s parents immigrated from Central America and he was born in Cambridge. He is the youngest in his family of two brothers and a sister. At home, Steven speaks Spanish with his family which will come in handy to help TCB's Spanish speaking residents.

Steven is proud that his life is on the right track and is the first in his family to get his GED and graduate from a technical training program. When he told Julie Fennell, YouthBuild's Career Coordinator, that he received the job at TCB, she told Steven "to impress them now like you impressed us." Steven said he "wants to be the door opener" for other YouthBuild graduates in the future. Scott Ployer, TCB Portfolio Manager, is delighted to have Steven join his team and looks forward to working with Steven, ”because he is willing to learn and is very motivated - a winning combination."