By Shannon Holmes
June 27, 2005

Mayor's workforce directors from cities across the country gathered in Chicago for The U.S. Conference of Mayors Workforce Development Council (WDC) Board meeting held in conjunction with the 73rd Annual Conference of Mayors. Ray Worden, President of the WDC welcomed board of trustees and council members from cities across the country including Arlington (TX), Baltimore, Boston, Canton (OH), Chicago, Columbus (GA), Detroit, Elkhart (IN), Gary (IN), Hammond (IN), Hartford, Houston, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Louisville, Nashville, Park Ridge (IL), Peoria (IL), Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Providence, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle and Vincennes (IN). Byron Zuidema, Regional Administrator for the U. S. Department of Labor brought greetings to the group.

The WDC Board addressed issues around the reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act, the budget for fiscal year 2006, youth employment and industry sector initiatives. The WDC also participated in a mobile workshop to visit the Chicago Manufacturing Campus, which supports the Ford Motor plant in Chicago.

With the ever growing gap between prepared and disconnected youth in the workforce, the first day focused on addressing the issues and potential solutions to solve the youth employment crisis currently facing this country.

Dr. Paul Harrington, Associate Director for the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University, presented the findings of Youth Disconnection In Large Cities report prepared for the Conference of Mayors which examined youth employment in the 59 largest cities. Harrington said that despite the growth in GDP, job growth has not increased at the same rate, and employment growth in the last four years has occurred outside big cities. Harrington said that never before has there been such deterioration in the teen labor market as now. According to the report, employment for youth 16-19 is at 36 percent, the lowest it has been since data collection began 56 years ago. With the economy having recovered from the recession, jobs that once went to the youth population are now being taken by adult immigrants.

Harrington reported huge reductions in job access in cities between 2000 and 2004 for teens ages 16 — 19. Labor employment rates dropped ten percent between 2000 and 2004 for 16 to 19 years olds in larger cities, but only dropped 5 percent for 20 to 25 year olds. Harrington found that more than 18 percent of the 16 to 24 year old population in the large cities were disconnected from both school and work. Though the large cities were home to under 19 percent of all the nation's 16 to 24 year olds, they accounted for one our of four disconnected youth in the nation at the time of the 2000 Census. Harrington also found that more than one half of all the disconnected youth residing in large cities failed to earn a high school diploma. The report supported the notion that the more education and work experience youth have, the likelihood of obtaining and retaining employment increases.

David Brown, Executive Director of the National Youth Employment Coalition, said that older youth issues are getting unprecedented attention nationally with the focus on high schools and that dropout recovery strategies should be part of high school reform strategies. Brown also called for expanding and improving collaborations across education systems with youth serving systems. Howard Knoll, Operations Manager at Arbor E & T, and NYEC's Chair, called for better partnerships with the foster care system. James Reed, Vice President of the Workforce Development Department at the National Urban League, reported on their new program funded by the Department of Labor (DOL) to serve out-of'school and adjudicated youth, which has enrolled 850 youth to date. Linda Harris, Senior Policy Analyst at the Center for Law and Social Policy, called for the workforce system to raise the visibility of their expertise in working with disconnected youth and urged sending a message that we are facing a national crisis with our future workforce.

As the public workforce system has become more demand driven, expertise with sector-based initiatives is increasing. A panel of three WDC members shared their experience with sector based initiatives in three different industries, life science, financial services, and manufacturing.

Joanne Joyce, President of the Indianapolis Private Industry Council (IPIC), reported on their partnership with the life science industry in the Indianapolis area. As Central Indiana is home to an estimated 900 life science companies employing about 82,000 people, they formed a public-private partnership that has been the hallmark of Indianapolis' development called the BioCrossroads initiative, which ultimately raised $74 million in venture capital for life science companies.

A 2003 study showed that 38,000 new positions in medical manufacturing and health care delivery would be created in central Indiana from 2003 to 2008. IPIC partnered with the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lily and Company to address the question of how to train these workers. As a result, a two-year associate's degree in biotechnology was created at Ivy Tech State College and Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis to prepare workers for 7,893 jobs that existed in 2000 and another 3,083 that were expected to be created from 2003-08. The credits are then able to be applied to continue into a four-year bachelor's degree at one of these institutions.

In an effort to address the issue of youth and young adults not being prepared for the future workforce, IPIC created Biotech Bound, a four-year pilot program that will provide at-risk young adults with comprehensive support services and school expenses so they can seek an associate's degree.

In Pittsburgh, there has been a great linkage between the public workforce system and the financial services industry. Ron Painter, Executive Director of the Three Rivers Workforce Investment Board (WIB), reported on the linkage between the workforce investment board and companies like Mellon Financial and PNC Bank. Over the past ten to15 years, Pittsburgh has lost over 150,000 steel manufacturing jobs, which left a serious void in employment.

Currently there are 68,000 people employed in finance and real estate in Pittsburgh and Alleghany County, and there is a need for more. In order to address this, the WIB worked with Mellon Financial to develop a chart of entry level positions and professional positions, with the corresponding skill sand training that are needed. As a result, the training was easily identified and obtained by those who needed it, creating a seamless process in moving people into jobs in financial services and providing opportunities for career advancement within the industry sector.

Painter stated that one of its most unique partners has been The Dollar Energy Fund. The Dollar Energy Fund was set up through the utility companies for people to donate a dollar as part of their bill to assist those with problems with their utilities. The Fund now serves all of Pennsylvania and parts of New York, West Virginia, Ohio, Virginia, and Tennessee. In order to fill the entry level positions in customer service, The Fund recruits through those who call in seeking financial assistance with their utilities costs, and refers those interested in training to the appropriate location.

Additionally, the WIB has partnered with the Pittsburgh Foundation, which has a forum with financial literacy and K-12 to ensure that it is a priority that youth are getting trained in the skills that are needed to move into and be successful in the workforce.

Allison Motz, Director of Workforce Development for the city of Cleveland, said that northeast Ohio is still home to a wide array of manufacturing concerns with industries that include: plastic products and chemicals; motor vehicle components and equipment; biomedicator products; and instrumentation and controls among many other industries. There is also a diverse talent pool here that includes: people with metal working, pipefitting or mechanical repair skills; scientists, engineers, tool and die-makers; electricians and other craftsmen and people who like to work with their hands. The only problem is the pool is shrinking as more of these people reach retirement, and youth are not interested in getting manufacturing jobs.

In an effort to address the need, the Manufacturing Sector Advisory Council was formed with area employers, training providers, local advocacy agencies, and the workforce investment board. Some of the partners include West Side Industrial Retention Network (WIRE-Net), Swagelok, Fredon Corporation, Cuyahoga Community College (as well as other local community colleges and vocational schools) and NEOMAC, the local area manufacturing awareness agency.

The local community colleges have developed an innovative program called Manufacturing 101. This program, designed with input from local employers, focuses on the basic soft skills needed to work in manufacturing. Additionally, a short-term manufacturing program geared towards production and assembly positions and career advancement was also established.

Working with NEOMAC, the Council is anticipated to host several community events to engage youth in a more active setting than those of the past by linking schools with the manufacturing industry. The Manufacturing Sector Advisory Council has begun to promote the Manufacturing Career Awareness Campaign with local chambers of commerce and the local community colleges to educate about the advantage of manufacturing as an occupation. At the same time, local trade organizations work with adult education programs to address the issue of attrition and how to attract the youth.

At the conclusion of the panel presentation, WDC members engaged in a discussion of barriers that they have faced, as well as solutions, to working with different industry sectors across the country.

Members of the WDC participated in a mobile workshop of the Chicago Manufacturing Campus (CMC), the largest campus of its kind in North America, where the Ford Motor Company built and leased to a dozen of its suppliers from around the country and abroad a $400 million complex of state-of-the-art factories in Chicago, suitable for robotic manufacture and sub-assembly of half the parts going into its new cars.

This mobile workshop explored the unique success and challenges of the Chicago Manufacturing Campus from several distinct perspectives. Jerry Szatan, a writer and consultant for corporate site selection and economic development, described how a 155-acre brownfield on Chicago's southeast side was chosen and transformed into Ford's first-ever North American automotive supplier campus.

Randi Brokvist, Project Manager at the Mayor's Office of Workforce Development (MOWD), illustrated the conceptual framework of one of the largest and most ambitious business'driven employment projects ever undertaken by the city with the Chicago Advantage Hiring Initiative, which hired and trained Chicago residents for CMC positions.

Grace Garcia, workforce development director of the Southeast Chicago Development Commission, a Chicago Advantage contractor, provided a view of the practical day-to-day considerations of screening and assessing the experience and aptitude of thousands of job seekers, and providing access to customized training at a state-of-the-art facility at nearby Olive-Harvey College.

WDC members were provided with a tour of the TDC Automotive plant, one of the suppliers on the CMC. TDC Automotive plant manager Mike Boyle, conducted a tour of the facility and shared his experience of working with city government and the quality of employees the Chicago Advantage delivered. "Working with MOWD to get trained staff was the easiest part of putting this whole operation together. We were always on time or ahead of schedule with staffing needs and it was because of these folks," said Boyle.

Members also got to meet Edward Kendall, a Tower Automotive employee and the 1,000th CMC hire, and hear about his experience with Chicago Advantage and working at the CMC. The ongoing, on'the-job training component of Chicago Advantage continues to help workers advance within their respective companies, earn higher wages, and enjoy long-term career success.

Through the Chicago Advantage hiring initiative, spearheaded by the MOWD, 1,038 Chicagoans were placed in permanent jobs, accounting for over 80 percent of the newly created positions at the campus. The Chicago Advantage hiring initiative, which has become a model for the integration of workforce development projects in the city's future development plans, proves that workforce development can be a powerful economic development tool.

The members of the WDC also joined mayors at the Standing Committee meeting on Workforce Development, chaired by Acting Chair Rochester (NY) Mayor William A. Johnson Jr., where an update on the status of reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act and priorities of the Department of Labor was given by Cristina Reyna, Intergovernmental Assistant from the Office of Intergovernmental and Congressional Affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor. Ray Worden, President of the WDC and Workforce Development Bureau Manger for Long Beach (CA), also provided information to the mayors on WIA reauthorization and outlook for the 2006 fiscal year budget.