John Padilla has put together a map for people having trouble finding their way to a job during the recession.
Padilla’s map includes a dozen stops where job seekers can find help with education, skills and general workplace information.
People who work at the various information stops on the road map will give them directions, fill them up on information and help point them to their goal, which is the best job they can get, said Padilla, who works for Annie E. Casey Family Services in New Haven. He created the road map with help from the Workforce Alliance.
The Casey group is part of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a Baltimore-based philanthropy that partners with local organizations to aid children in need and their families.
There were more than 24,000 unemployed people in the New Haven workforce in April, the last month for which the Bureau of Labor Statistics had information, a more than 10,000 increase over the same month in 2008.
Many of the newly unemployed have a short-term problem. They have the skills and education to find a job, proven by the fact that they found good jobs before. But so many jobs have been eliminated in the recession. They will find jobs once the economy recovers because they have proven themselves, Padilla said.
“The stimulus package is about the last million people [nationally] who lost their jobs,” he said. “It is the next million who will need jobs” once the recession ends.
Padilla said the impetus for his road-map brochure was to help those who don’t have the skills, who want an income but have little or no idea how to start the process of finding a job to get that income.
“A lot of our focus here in New Haven is what we call family economic success, helping families build economic security,” he said. His core audience for the program includes city residents, low-income people, single moms and the working poor, he said.
“We hear a lot of people say ‘I don’t know where to go for service. Who can I go to get a job?’ You hear that enough and after a while, you realize that there really is a shortage of good information,” he said.
“This was basically conceived as a way to put information at someone’s fingertips quickly, at least to help orient them. The whole idea of the map, was starting on the road” to finding a job, he said.
“Long-term attachment to the work force is a process,” he said.
One side of the brochure, an 8 1/2 by 14-inch glossy paper folded four times, contains the map, with a dozen billboard-type signs offering the various skills or help, starting with “I need a job today” and “child-care” signs and ending with basic computer skills, driver’s license recovery and financial education and credit repair for those who have located jobs or begun working. Each category has anywhere from two to nine places to get the help advertised on the sign.
On the other side is contact information for the agencies and nonprofits that could help job seekers. The Casey Foundation late last month printed 2,500 of the brochures at a cost of $2,000. They are available at the pubic library, the career center on the Boulevard, the Workforce Alliance, the Community Action Agency or by calling the Casey foundation at (203) 401‑6900.
“We convened all the people who are in the brochure, and asked them if this would be a good tool. They all said absolutely,” he said.
“Basic literacy is a big issue,” Padilla said. “Any one who is serious about trying to build careers for themselves has to address their basic skill needs to the extent that they have them,” he said. “It is unrealistic to think you will get a career job if you can only read at the sixth or seventh-grade level,” he said.
In fact, federal statistics show that a person without a high school diploma will earn $600,000 in a 50-year working lifetime, while someone with a diploma will earn $850,000, he said. A person with a college degree will earn $1.9 million.
But for those who need money right now, Padilla advises contacting a temporary agency and taking other steps while working. A quick phone survey of New Haven temporary agencies showed there were jobs available for unskilled people.
Once people are working, then they can address the other skills deficits they have, such as education, workplace skills or legal skills, as examples, he said.
“As you refer that person to a temp agency, you want to find out what is going on in that individual’s life that has him in the situation that he is presenting to you,” he said.
At the other extreme is someone who has just gotten out of jail, doesn’t have a work ethic, a work history. That person needs to work on basic skills.
“The employment application is the proxy for literacy. You can’t fill out the application, it goes in the trash the moment you walk out the door,” he said.
A local community activist said that the program sounds like something that is “sorely needed” in New Haven. A key challenge will be letting people like him know it exists, he said.
“We have all these programs, but there is a high level of ambivalence on the part of folks who are looking for jobs,” said the Rev. Kevin Ewing, president of the West River Neighborhood Services Corp.
“This has to get to people who work with the people, the management teams, the neighborhood services people, and street outreach workers should have it,” he said. “It should be put into grocery stores and liquor stores. You need to go to the people.”