“They come from prison, they come from shelters,” said Israel Gil, 44, another graduate of the program who went on to supervise the street cleaning crews. “They have no work skills… That's the hard part for them.”

“The majority of our guys have these pasts,” Griffin said. “They’re convicted felons. They're up against people with no (criminal) histories for the same jobs because people need jobs.”

Lee Alman, director of public affairs at the Doe Fund, concedes that it may be more difficult for graduates to obtain jobs in this economy, but believes that it may just take longer than it used to. The main difference, Alman believes, is that the type of jobs available to program graduates will change.

In response, the program is shifting its training toward “green jobs.” They already have a business dubbed “resource recovery,” which collects used cooking oil from local restaurants and sells it for conversion into biodiesel. They are also looking into creating a “weatherization” service to optimize energy-use in buildings. Their goal is for the skills learned in these new enterprises to be applicable to a variety of green-related jobs upon graduation.

Jeremy Reiss, a director at the Community Service Society, deals frequently with the same population that Ready, Willing and Able serves. His worry is not about graduates being placed in jobs, it is about their ability to stay in these jobs and earn enough money to maintain self-sufficiency.

“Six months from now, what is Ready, Willing and Able doing to make sure people are staying in these jobs and helping them move up the career trajectory?” asked Reiss. Graduates aren’t going to be moving into jobs with living wages, he added, noting that necessities like health care, paid sick leave and prescription drug coverage are often not covered by the types of employers hiring program graduates.

Job prospects aside, trainees seem to have enough on their minds while they’re going through the program.

“You look back at the damage you've done, it can become pretty depressing,” Griffin said, noting that once sobriety is achieved and reflection sets in, the program gets mentally tougher.

“The hardest part is getting up in the morning,” Israel Gil said. “I was determined to change my life.”