WHEREAS since 1994, the AmeriCorps national service program has proven to be a highly effective way to engage Americans of all ages and backgrounds in meeting a wide range of community needs and promote the ethic of service and volunteering; and

WHEREAS each year AmeriCorps, including AmeriCorps VISTA and AmeriCorps NCCC, provides opportunities for 75,000 citizens across the nation, including approximately 1,300 in Mississippi, to give back in an intensive way to our communities, our state, and our country; and

WHEREAS AmeriCorps was designed to give a key role to states in directing resources to meet state and local needs through the work of Governor-appointed state service commissions, including the Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service; and

WHEREAS AmeriCorps has strengthened America's independent sector by investing more than $5 billion dollars to support the efforts of tens of thousands of nonprofit, community, educational, and faith-based community groups nationwide; and those grants have leveraged hundreds of millions of additional funds and in-kind donations from others sources; and

WHEREAS in 2007-2008, Mississippi AmeriCorps members recruited and supervised more than 54,000 community volunteers who provided over 400,000 hours of community service, demonstrating AmeriCorps value as a powerful catalyst and force multiplier; and

WHEREAS since 1994, more than 540,000 men and women across the nation, including 9,500 from Mississippi, have taken the AmeriCorps pledge to "get things done for America"; and

WHEREAS those AmeriCorps members have served a total of more than 705 million hours nationwide, including 14.5 million hours served by AmeriCorps members in Mississippi, helping to improve the lives of our state 's most vulnerable citizens, strengthen our educational system, protect our environment, and contribute to our public safety; and

WHEREAS AmeriCorps members nationwide, in return for their service, have earned more than $1.4 billion in Segal AmeriCorps Education Awards to use to further their own educational advancement at colleges and universities-including more than $39 million in education award dollars used at Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning and other Mississippi Title IV entities; and

WHEREAS AmeriCorps members, after their terms of service end, remain engaged in our communities as volunteers, teachers, public servants, and nonprofit leaders in disproportionately high levels; and

WHEREAS, AmeriCorps Week (May 9-16, 2009) is an opportune time for the people of Mississippi to salute AmeriCorps members and alums for their powerful impact; thank all of AmeriCorps' community partners in Mississippi who make the program possible; and bring more Americans into service;

NOW THEREFORE, I, Haley Barbour, Governor of the State of Mississippi, by virtue of the authority vested in me, do hereby recognize and proclaim May 9-16, 2009 as

AMERICORPS WEEK

in Mississippi, and urge citizens to thank AmeriCorps members and alumni for their service and to find ways to give back to their communities.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Great Seal of the State of Mississippi to be affixed.

DONE in the City of Jackson on the 9th day of April in the year of our Lord, two thousand and nine, and in the anniversary of the United of America, the two hundred and thirty-third.

Governor Haley Barbour

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