ST. PETERSBURG — To try to curb unemployment and poverty in some of the city’s poorest areas, the City Council on Thursday will vote to spend nearly $3 million over the next three years to fund a workforce development program in the South St. Petersburg Community Redevelopment Area.
The grant will come from funds collected through the redevelopment area and be used to administer St. Pete Works!, a program that has been around since 2017 and brings together various community organizations to boost employment. St. Petersburg College won the contract to run the program.
The goal is to find work for people within the redevelopment area — where unemployment has historically been twice that of the city at large — who want to retool in the age of COVID-19, as well as help people who often struggle finding jobs.
“This program isn’t going to fix that double unemployment rate on its own," said Mike Ramsey, St. Petersburg College’s dean of workforce development. "But I think it can make a ripple in the pond that can be built upon for years to come. This work is not something that’s going to eradicate those inequities and those differences in three years, but we believe it’s a start.”
For its first three years, St. Pete Work! was administered by the Pinellas Ex-Offender Re-Entry Coalition, which focused on finding work for hard-to-hire individuals, including young folks who may have a criminal record or are recovering drug addicts. The contract with the coalition expired this year, and city officials put it out for bid. The college beat out the Pinellas Opportunity Council, which also submitted a proposal.
The timing of the new contract was not related to the coronavirus, but the toll the pandemic has taken on the economy has factored into expectations. While hard-to-hire workers remain a focus, an added component of the program under St. Petersburg College’s leadership will be to help people acquire skills for careers in one of the city’s five “Grow Smarter” target industries: marine and life sciences, specialized manufacturing, creative arts and design, financial services and data analytics. Most of the training will take place at St. Petersburg College’s Midtown Center on 22nd Street S.
“These are folks who are maybe not hard to hire, but the industrial upheaval because of the pandemic is forcing a reevaluation of career paths," said Rick Smith, St. Petersburg’s community redevelopment coordinator. “This is career building.”
The contract, which runs three years, requires the college to recruit 363 workers seeking job assistance and training over that term, at least 150 in Grow Smarter industries. Of those, at least 225 must be placed into positions, 51 of which must be at Grow Smarter businesses. If all goes well, the city has the option to extend the contract for two years.
One critical component is getting employers to sign on who are willing to take the students once they graduate from the program. Ramsey characterized it as a win-win: a graduate lands a job, and the business can diversify.
“It’s all for naught if we don’t get the employers," he said. “The more diverse your workforce is, the stronger it is in the long run.”
If the program is successful, officials say it can be scaled citywide.
“Now, more than ever, there’s a focus on equity,” said Ramsey. “Everybody knows those areas in St. Petersburg that have been left behind. ... And now’s the time to make a concerted effort.”
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November 17, 2020 at 03:15AM
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Amid the pandemic, St. Petersburg focuses on helping workers find work - Tampa Bay Times
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