SPOLEENOST SVATY JAN POD SKALOU (SSJPS)

Organizational Vision
Citizen Base Strategy
Results

Organizational Vision

SSJPS is a Czech citizen sector organization, which was formed to provide hope and self-sufficiency for people with disabilities by training them in the production and instruction of traditional craft, and connecting them into communities of mutual support.

Citizen Base Strategy

SSJPS works with its clients to teach them a traditional craft, to produce products to sell on the market and to offer courses in these crafts to the disabled and the non-disabled alike. While many traditional crafts like traditional weaving, basket making, pottery and dry flower arrangements have all but disappeared from the Czech mainstream, SSJPS has discovered that a strong market for these handicrafts still exists. Utilizing a fee-for-service scheme for mobilizing resources, SSJPS has helped provide the disabled with productive occupations, while filling a need for handicrafts and helping to continue traditional cultural forms.

Based in a center, which was built through initial donations from The Development of Public Society Foundation and material suppliers, SSJPS has a permanent resource center in which it conducts its activities. After establishing the center from initial seed capital, SSJPS could then concentrate on developing and sustaining its programs. SSJPS trains disabled participants free of charge, while offering identical training courses to the public at large at a fixed rate. This pricing scheme, called cross-subsidization, is a common method in distributing financial burden from those who can afford to pay them from those who cannot, while still providing the service.

Results

With these courses, SSJPS is achieving a dual-goal: the disabled are teaching the public a form of skilled work and in doing so not only gaining self-respect but also changing the prevailing societal views of the disabled. Further revenue is generated from selling the handicrafts and from the membership base, who pay 50 krowns in exchange for the center's services. SSJPS has been successful in covering 75 percent of the costs of supporting the programs for the disabled with product and training revenues, while 25 percent are provided by state grants. Twenty percent of the operating costs are generated through membership dues, while the remaining 80 percent is supplied by state grants.