Local News in Brief : Youth Job Program Urged

Mayor Tom Bradley proposed a $1-million “Clean and Green” youth employment program Monday in which 600 junior and senior high school students would be hired to clean up graffiti, plant trees and pick up litter.

The program, to be included in the mayor’s 1988-89 budget package proposal, calls for hiring students from junior and senior high schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District to work for $4.25 to $4.50 an hour.

Three hundred students would be hired to work three Saturdays per month during the school year and 300 more would be hired to work a four-day workweek during the summer.

Bradley said 480 of the 600 students hired each year would be junior high school students because experts believe that that age group is particularly susceptible to recruitment by youth gangs.

“The ‘Clean and Green’ program will not only give Los Angeles-area students the opportunity to be involved in their neighborhood, but it will give our young people an opportunity to earn money while they learn teamwork and community pride,” Bradley said.