Page 11 - SKILLS Workforce Development Guide 2021

workforce entities, expand apprenticeships, and address the long-term needs of growing industries. It can also be used to improve the economic security of women, youth, and other groups facing barriers to career advancement. “There is still about $150 million left to be allocated,” Chapin says. “They haven’t been allocating a lot of funds since the pandemic hit. We’re hoping that changes.”
The WCA, in the interim, has also won some grants, such as two received last year from Entergy. One was a $12,500 grant to help 25 students at Westchester County Community College complete a respiratory care program. “A lot of students have already been placed,” notes Chapin. “If you place 25 students making $40,000 a year, that has a huge economic impact.”
The Westchester Community Foundation (WCF), a philanthropic organization, funds another program at Westchester Community College to recruit and train students for an 11-week boot camp for healthcare occupations, through the Westchester Workforce Funders Collaborative, where several charitable funders have pooled their resources.
The program offers participants a chance to do a four-week externship/job shadowing experience at a Montefiore hospital or healthcare facility, and a chance to interview with its employer partners Burke Rehabilitation Hospital, Montefiore Medical Center, and Wartburg, a senior-living facility. Another nonprofit WCF funds through the collaborative is Westhab, a housing and social services organization.
CHALLENGES AHEAD
But there remain some obstacles to programs like these, such as access to transportation and affordable, high- quality childcare. Both the Westchester Community College program and Westhab have case management services
to help problem-solve on these fronts, notes Tara Seeley, senior program officer at the WCF. “The programs had to demonstrate employer partnerships and their plans to address this,” says Seeley.
The high cost of housing is another issue that affects the local talent pool. The WCA has recommended in its 2020 Policy Playbook that the county work to ensure adequate housing for all workers. The Policy Playbook points to the Westchester County Housing Needs Assessment study, which determined that the county needs 11,000 new affordable housing units to accommodate all Westchester households, as well as people seeking homes in the county who cannot afford
market-rate housing. As noted in the report, “Local businesses that require skilled workers and a stable workforce suffer when workers cannot afford to live where they work. A community may experience a depleted hiring pool if housing prices are too high, starving local businesses of workers or forcing these businesses to pay higher salaries to subsidize commuting costs. Communities also suffer when workers who serve the public interest, such as teachers, police, fire personnel and local government workers, look elsewhere for affordable housing and employment.”
As Michael Romita, president and CEO of the WCA puts it, “We want to create a system that works for everybody. “That’s not only morally just. It’s good for business.”
“We want to create a system that works for everybody. That’s not only morally just. It’s good for business.”
—Michael Romita, President and CEO, Westchester County Association
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