SSIP Annual Reports 2018 Annual Report | Page 38

38 SEWER SYSTEM IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM | Grey. Green. Clean. COMMUNITY BENEFITS The SFPUC is the first public utility in the nation to adopt Environmental Justice and Community Benefits policies. Our “good neighbor” policies ensure we are giving back to the communities where we provide high-quality water, power, and sewer services. We are especially committed to working with communities that are most impacted by our operations. Guided by these policies, the SSIP is a once in a lifetime opportunity to leverage our investments and partnerships to support environmental, workforce, education, and art initiatives in the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood, which is home to our Southeast Treatment Plant. Youth Employment: SSIP CityWorks The SSIP CityWorks Internship Program completed its sixth year of providing paid summer internships to students from San Francisco’s Southeast neighborhoods. Sponsored by social impact commitments from private engineering firms and managed by Young Community Developers (YCD), the program allowed 15 interns to spend eight weeks working with the SFPUC or private firms on SSIP projects happening in their community. Through the program, SSIP CityWorks interns learned valuable on-the-job skills and were exposed to the exciting and diverse career opportunities in the water and wastewater industries such as: engineering, architecture, environmental management, and communications. Interns also visited the SFPUC’s Southeast Treatment Plant and Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, which provided a tangible SSIP CityWorks interns on a plant tour.