| Duke University, in partnership with the University of North Carolina, will receive a Community Outreach Partnership Centers (COPC) grant of $399,985 to provide outreach and applied research to six neighborhoods in South West Central Durham. Almost 40 percent of the residents in these areas live below the poverty line. However, the neighborhoods have many internal strengths on which the COPC project will capitalize.
Activities to be undertaken include: - Conducting a series of workshops to improve community/police relations.
- Improving participation in self-sufficiency programs at several public housing developments.
- Providing free legal services, especially on fair housing issues, to neighborhood residents at the COPC storefront.
- Offering job training scholarships to neighborhood residents by providing funding for transportation and childcare so that they can attend training classes
- Creating a neighborhood construction company to train and employ neighborhood residents while improving the neighborhood itself.
The project includes almost $1.4 million in matching funds, with more than half that amount coming from local sources outside the universities.
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