Small Town News

NRCS Honors Volunteers During National Volunteer Week

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Salina, Kansas, April 16, 2010-National Volunteer Week is April 18 to 24. U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is celebrating National Volunteer Week by thanking and honoring its volunteers for their service to conservation. In Fiscal Year 2009, nationally, more than 36,000 people donated more than 693,000 hours to conservation as members of NRCS' volunteer group-Earth Team.

During 2010, Earth Team is celebrating 25 years of service to conservation. In that time, over a half-million Earth Team volunteers have donated 15.5 million hours valued at $314 million.

Kansas NRCS State Conservationist Eric B. Banks reports that last year the state's 4,342 Earth Team volunteers donated 62,707 volunteer hours in Kansas. "That's worth $1,269,816.70 of benefit to our customers and the taxpayers," said Banks. "These are impressive numbers, and we are grateful for the help, but we also recognize much more conservation work needs to be done." (More information about the Kansas Earth Team efforts is available at

www.ks.nrcs.usda.gov/about, click on Earth Team Volunteers.)

Earth Team is a program which partners volunteers with NRCS employees. It was created in' 1985 and offers many opportunities to individuals over the age of 14 who are interested in volunteering and making a positive difference for the nation's natural resources. Earth Team volunteers help NRCS conservationists provide everything from conservation technical assistance to teaching and generating awareness about conservation through the use of community projects.

"We at NRCS are proud of the dedicated volunteers and employees who have committed their time and talents to conserving and protecting soil, water and wildlife for their community and everyone in it," said Banks. "We hope National Volunteer Week will motivate others to volunteer to help NRCS with our mission of Helping People Help the Land."

Information on the Earth Team Volunteer Program is available online at http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/feature/vol-unteers or by calling (toll-free) 888-LANDCARE.

NRCS (originally called the Soil Conservation Service) has provided leadership in a partnership effort to help America's private landowners and managers conserve their soil, water and other natural resources since 1935. The agency is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. For more information on NRCS visit www.nrcs.usda.gov.

*Note: The Value of Volunteer Time to the Agency is $20.25/hour as established by the Independent Sector and utilized by the Federal Interagency Team for Volunteerism. The $314 million figure uses 2010 dollars.



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© 2010 The Prairie Post White City, Kansas. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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