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$1.8 million grant will address local workforce issues related to opioids
YOUNGSTOWN
New grant funding to address workforce issues related to the opioid epidemic will bring together local agencies to collaborate in new ways.
Both the Workforce Development Board Inc. of Mahoning and Columbiana counties and the Workforce Development Board of Trumbull County will be meeting in the coming weeks with the mental health and recovery boards in their counties to discuss the best way to use $1.8 million Mahoning and Trumbull counties are slated to receive from the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.
The funding – about $900,000 to each county – comes from a Department of Labor Trade and Economic Transition National Dislocated Worker Grant for which the state applied. In total, $8 million will go to 16 counties in Ohio that have been most affected by the opioid epidemic.
In its application, ODJFS noted Ohio is experiencing “the far-reaching economic and workforce transition of disruption in skill and labor availability,” due in part to the opioid epidemic’s effect on “loss of life, reduced worker productivity and substantial reductions in the labor force participation rate.”
ODJFS cited research estimates that of the labor force decline of 300,000 people between 2007 and 2016, one-third to one-half of that number could be due to opioid use.
Bert Cene, director of the Workforce Development Board Inc. of Mahoning and Columbiana Counties, said his agency and the Mahoning County Mental Health & Recovery Board will work more closely together than they have before, thanks to this program.
“We also want to work with our business community to really let them know these people are recovering, and we need to get them back and engaged in the workforce,” Cene said.
The program will address two issues in the Mahoning Valley: people in recovery having difficulty finding jobs and employers having trouble finding skilled workers.
In Trumbull County, William Turner, executive director of the workforce development board, said his agency plans to form a coalition with area social-service agencies that have the expertise to determine how the funds can be used best.
“We plan on delving in and trying to get people back in the workforce or back on the way into the workforce,” he said.