By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
The Community Action Partnership of Greater St. Joseph has been allocated $250,000 of CARES Act funding for a temporary labor assistance program.
CAP St. Joe Executive Director Whitney Lanning says this program creates jobs to help the homeless and unemployed population get back on their feet.
"Get residents from our homeless shelter involved in various clean-up activities around the community," Lanning said. "They get paid an hourly wage for that service."
The city partners with Workforce Solutions in St. Joseph to operate this program. Lanning says the city first started the labor assistance program about 1.5 years ago with positive results, but it was later suspended due to inadequate funding.
"We had over 50 percent of the participants gained stable and consistent employment," said Lanning.
The city used to run a similar program with prison inmates, but that was suspended during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Most of the jobs will be with the Parks, Recreation and Civic Facilities Department, which suffered from staff shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The work will mostly consist of clean-up projects, and also beautification. For example, participants last year planted lilies around a parking garage downtown.
"It's really just a win-win situation," Lanning said. "The city gets beautified and gets some issues taken care of. The participants we have really get to regain dignity through work."
The city of St. Joseph will also soon be allocated $1.3 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to help combat the ongoing homelessness crisis in the city. This money comes from the latest $1.9 trillion stimulus package that recently passed through Congress.
Lanning says it'll be determined later how exactly this money will be used, and just how much CAP St. Joe will receive, but she's confident the $1.3 million will be used to help those most in need.
"It's really important that you understand the issues in the community," Lanning said. "With our partnership with the city and the work we do, we understand where the needs are. So, being really vocal about where those dollars should be used is going to be really important."
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