Photo by Marlina Sanz.
President Michael Hightower meets with Michelle, who recently obtained a
job as a receptionist through Santa Clara County's Job Connection.
More than 150 people attended the welfare reform implementation hearing Monday, May 19, hosted by NACo President Michael Hightower and Santa Clara County (Calif.) Board Chair Jim Beall. Panels covered issues ranging from the effect of welfare reform on immigrants, to what works in job training and job retention, and the employer's perspective.
This was the third in a series of four hearings that NACo is holding across the country.
Noting that Santa Clara County is one of the counties most affected by the denial of federal benefits such as Supplemental Security Income to legal immigrants, Hightower began the hearing by addressing this issue. "I congratulate Supervisor Bell and Santa Clara County for the leadership they showed in being the first county to implement an outreach program to help legal immigrants become citizens," Hightower said.
Beall began the presentations by talking about the county's employment support initiative. "We decided early on not to wait for the state to act, and decided to develop our own program under which we put an emphasis on prevention," Beall said.
A formal presentation of the county's program was provided by Social Services Director Yolanda Rinaldo. She emphasized that the county's program is designed to not only help people get jobs but to also help them upgrade their skills while they are on the job.
One of the initiatives that the county will implement is an extended childcare hotline from 6 a.m.-9 p.m. to help those individuals who are faced with a childcare emergency.
Rinaldo also mentioned that the county is hoping to use a transportation planning grant to assess the community's transit needs to get people to work and to help train welfare recipients to become public transit employees. Hightower remarked that access to transportation and child care have been common themes throughout all the hearings.
Richard Konda, who directs the Santa Clara County immigration outreach project, explained the initiative. The county allocated $250,000 to provide citizenship services. In collaboration with local nonprofit groups, the county is identifying people - including those in nursing homes and centers for the developmentally disabled - and helping them with the process. The county was also able to obtain funding from the Lucille Packard Foundation to serve those people who are not able to leave their homes.
In the panel on job training and retention, Jean Ross, from the California Budget Project, put the state's challenge into perspective. She estimated that about 665,000 adults will need to find jobs. While in some places there are a large number of jobs available, it is unlikely that the state will be able to sustain the current level of economic growth.
Despite the fact that the state has managed to get out of its recession, she noted that there are still areas of the state where there are 10 or 15 seekers for each new job.
Keith Lee, director of San Bernardino County's (Calif.) Jobs and Employment Services, pointed out that individuals must be treated on a case-by-case basis. While some individuals are ready to go to work, Lee pointed out that between 40 and 50 percent of the population on public assistance need some English as a Second Language or other basic job skills training and may have to go onto short-term training or community work experience.
"In a county like San Bernardino, which is over 20,000 square miles and ranges from highly urbanized to very rural areas, there are no common answers," said Lee. In his county, the average unemployment rate is six percent, but some areas of the county are as high as 20 percent.
He emphasized the need to do labor market surveys to determine where the jobs are, how to access them, whether jobs are shrinking or growing, and what job skills are needed. In an effort at intergovernmental collaboration, the county is already contacting its 22 cities to determine their community work needs.
Robert Egnew, director of mental health services for Monterey County, Calif., addressed the challenges of serving populations with substance abuse problems. Estimates in his county show 20 percent of the adult recipients of Temporary Assistance to Needy Families with substance abuse issues. "It is not simply an issue of referring individuals to programs, we may need to serve four times as many individuals as our capacity allows," said Egnew.
He also pointed out that the system will need to change from one which serves primarily males in residential settings, to a system that will need to accommodate women with children.
Some of the key components that he mentioned are: retraining the social services workforce to identify people with addiction disorders, day treatment services, transitional employment to begin learning basic job skills and job readiness programs, transitional housing, case management and supportive services.
The last panel of the day included several employers. One of these, Selectron Corporation, has developed a partnership with the Center for Employment and Training. Under this partnership, they are constantly working to develop and redesign customized training for the electronic manufacturing industry. The company also helps support the center by providing tools and process improvements so that the training is up to date.
The program's graduates are thus employable not only at Selectron, but also at any other electronics manufacturer. The program's graduates go through the same screening as any other job applicant and are hired on a temporary basis with the knowledge that they may be offered permanent employment after a probationary period.
The company's human resources department has also made the commitment to work closely with the individual and the center, so that any additional training that is required can be provided quickly.
Some of the most compelling testimony came from former welfare participants. Terri Robles-Bell spoke of her own experience. She said that at one point her children were in foster care. Robles-Bell then began volunteer work and started seeing her own strength and abilities. Through her volunteer work, she found her current job and is working for the Social Services Department. She is now using her own experiences to mentor welfare recipients and help them get their lives in order.
Following the hearing, Hightower toured the county's Job Connection. At this center, the county helps match individuals to jobs, through the connections the center's job developer have made in the private sector.
When the center first opened, it had to market to businesses; now businesses are coming to it asking for employees. The center helps people with their resume writing, and interview skills, among other services. A computerized job bank serves the dual purpose of providing information about available jobs as well as helping participants learn how to use a computer.
The center also emphasizes peer support.
That day, they were celebrating two individuals who had just found jobs. One of the persons was Michelle, who had obtained a job as medical receptionist; the other, Armando had found work as a truck driver for a recycling company. Both shared their interview experiences and the skills that they thought had been the most important in helping them get the job.