Everybody Solar, GRID Alternatives, The Sierra Club & Indie Rock Band Team Up for Homeboy Industries

Trapdoor Social's music will raise funds through the crowdsourcing site www.pledgemusic.com

Appreciating that social responsibility is one of the benefits of playing popular music, Los Angeles-based band Trapdoor Social has teamed up with two outstanding energy leaders, Everybody Solar and GRID Alternatives, to install solar panels on a Los Angeles inner-city Homeboy Industries building. Funding for this unique and socially responsible project will be raised through the online crowdsourcing site www.pledgemusic.com


"Our goal is to use our band as a vessel for communication and to convey the urgency of environmental responsibility," noted lead singers of Trapdoor Social Merritt Graves and Skylar Funk.

"This is a great opportunity to marry fundraising and the music world for solar energy," added Youness Scally, Executive Director of Everybody Solar. "Our mission is to protect the environment and strengthen US communities through solar energy projects. This partnership will benefit Homeboy Industries, which has made a huge impact in the communities it serves. Our goal has always been to create healthy and sustainable communities and to improve them by giving the gift of clean energy to organizations like Homeboy Industries. By eliminating electricity costs for nonprofits we help them maximize their impact on their direct cause."

The promotion is live now and donors will receive Trapdoor Social's music and a number of other perks offered by the band. Simultaneously, everyone who donates becomes a partner in helping raise the needed funds for this worthwhile project. It's really that simple.

Trapdoor Social will work with GRID Alternatives Greater Los Angeles, a nonprofit organization that leads teams of volunteers and job trainees to install solar electric systems exclusively for low-income homeowners, providing needed savings for families struggling to make ends meet, preparing workers for jobs in the fast-growing solar industry and reducing carbon emissions. "This is an exciting project that brings music and sustainability together for the community in a smart innovative way," said GRID Alternatives Greater Los Angeles Executive Director Susie Chang. "As a partner of Homeboy Industries we're thrilled to be asked to install solar panels on their building."

The band has also found an enthusiastic partner to help spread the word on the fundraiser in the Sierra Club, whose My Generation Campaign works to bring clean energy to low income neighborhoods and communities of color. "The My Generation Campaign is very excited to be a part of this project" said Michael Sarmiento, My Generation Campaign Organizer, "It is a great opportunity to really highlight the importance of solar for all communities, especially low income and communities of color, to access all the environmental, health, and economic benefits that local clean energy can bring."

"This project, a sustainable partnership with Trapdoor Social, Everybody Solar and GRID brings awareness about renewable energy," said Father Greg Boyle, Founder and Executive Director of Homeboy Industries. "We are grateful to be the beneficiaries. With the installation of the solar panels at Homeboy Industries, we reduce our energy costs, promote Homeboy's Solar Panel Installation Training and Certification Program, and the hope is we get more people involved in our training program, completing the courses, passing the national test and eventually working in the solar panel installation industry."

About Everybody Solar
Everybody Solar is a nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, CA. They work to protect the environment and strengthen U.S. communities through solar energy projects. By providing solar power to local charities, they help these organizations reduce electricity costs and direct their limited resources to the communities they serve. Everybody Solar is a charitable organization and depends on volunteers and the generosity of the public to perform its mission. Visit them online at http://www.everybodysolar.org, like them at http://www.facebook.com/everybodysolar, or tweet at them at www.twitter.com/everybodysolar.

About Trapdoor Social
Trapdoor Social was founded in 2011 by Merritt Graves and Skylar Funk. They met at Pomona College in Southern California as Environmental Analysis majors and assert that "by day, we studied the challenges for planet Earth, and by night we found refuge in our music." While promoting their work in the busy Los Angeles music scene, Trapdoor Social walks the talk with their involvement in green companies like Farmscape (www.famscapegardens.com) and Agrisaurus http://www.agrisaurus.com, which Graves helped create.

About Homeboy Industries
Homeboy Industries is a nonprofit youth program which serves high-risk, formerly gang-involved men and women with a continuum of free services and programs and operates seven social enterprises that serve as job-training sites. Homeboy Industries covers tuition and supply costs for its clients who wish to enroll in the Photovoltaic Training program at East Los Angeles Skills Center. Homeboy also offers additional tutoring to help students pass a national credentialing test that makes its clients competitive candidates for employment in the green industry. www.homeboyindustries.org

For more information about the project, please contact Liz Oh for Everybody Solar at liz@solarmarketinggroup.com (phone: 415-346-9091), Diane Kounalakis for Trapdoor Social at kounalakis@comcast.net (phone: 415-987-0291) or Hannah Haines at Hannah@themusebox.net.

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