The Neighborhood Youth Corps: A Case Study in the Formation and Administration of a Government Bureau

Often ignored or misunderstood is the fact that a legislative program continues to develop and mature after its passage into law. Congress, unwilling, and essentially unable, to fill in the framework of its creation, leaves to the administrator a rough outline to be completed by his finer touch. Such a rough outline is the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964. Title I, Part B of that act provides for useful work experience to be offered to unemployed young men and women to improve their employability and to allow them to increase or continue their education. Nowhere in the act was the Neighborhood Youth Corps mentioned by name. Yet today, just over two years since its passage, 575,000 disadvantaged young people have been enrolled in over 1,150 Neighborhood Youth Corps projects across the nation