Legal References:
The Voluntary & Court Ordered Community Service Section includes:
Voluntary community service is an opportunity for participants to volunteer in activities with their child’s licensed child care, preschool, elementary school, Head Start, and ECEAP.This gives participants an opportunity to build their employment and parenting skills while spending time with their young children. This activity is only authorized for licensed child cares and preschools.
WorkFirst staff don’t develop voluntary community sites. Participants will work with their child’s licensed child care, licensed preschool or elementary school to set these up and lets their Case Manager know the site and their volunteer hours. Case Mangers then follow the process below to make needed arrangements to support the activity.
WorkFirst staff give participants who are interested in pursuing voluntary community service the informational flyer called WorkFirst Parent Volunteers. It will give them basic information about where they can volunteer, how to find a volunteer job and what they might be doing in their volunteer job. It will also ask them to contact their Case Manager once they have a volunteer job to provide their schedule and to make arrangements to verify their hours.
A poster, called Looking for WorkFirst Parent Volunteers, is also available for providers and CSOs to make participants aware of voluntary community service. Providers who are promoting the activity will also have access to the WorkFirst Parent Volunteers flyer.
Commerce may stack community service activities with a Community Jobs placement using their own processes to monitor participation and pay L&I premiums. (See WFHB 8.3.5)
WorkFirst staff may authorize voluntary or court ordered community service. Use the “VS” eJAS component for self-initiated voluntary community service and “XS” for court-ordered community service.
Community Service can be used in a variety of ways to help a participant meet participation requirements. WorkFirst staff may only approve voluntary and court-ordered community service, they don’t establish community service opportunities at other types of sites, such as food banks or state agencies. See the Stacking Activities section for more information about how we use participation in Community Service activities can meet participation requirements.
WorkFirst staff may authorize voluntary or court ordered community service activities when the participant:
WorkFirst staff must determine how many hours per week the parent can do community service activities. See the FLSA/Deeming section for more information on how to calculate the number of hours that can be require in Community Services activities. The court sets hourly requirements for court-ordered community service.
WorkFirst staff must also ensure the voluntary community service is supervised and make arrangements to verify the actual hours of participation. WorkFirst staff follow the non-contracted service documentation process in WFHB 3.7.2.6 including use of the WorkFirst Participation Verification form.