Homeboy Industries assists at-risk and formerly gang-involved youth to become positive and contributing members of society through job placement, training and education. Homeboy Industries traces its roots to Jobs For A Future, a program created in 1988 by Father Gregory Boyle while he was serving as pastor of Dolores Mission parish in Boyle Heights. Begun as a jobs program in 1988, offering alternatives to gang violence in one of the toughest neighborhoods in the city, the program soon grew beyond the parish. In 2001, Homeboy Industries became an independent nonprofit. Homeboy has had an important impact on the Los Angeles gang problem, with young people from over half of the region's 1,100 known gangs seeking a way out through Homeboy.