Cashing In On Charlotte’s Kid Labor Market
I’m sure it’s wholly coincidental that Mayor Anthony Foxx gets his Democrat-controlled city council to approve a renewed push for an amped-up jobs program for youths during the same week GOP mayoral hopeful Scott Stone officially rolls out his campaign with a signature platform of job creation and hammering Foxx for failing to adequately address Char-Meck’s sky-high unemployment rate.
In any case, the council on Monday night unanimously approved redirecting $100,000 in federal funds from the Workforce Development Board (WDB) and funneling the money into expanding city programs being championed by Foxx to focus on youth employment, job training, and education.
Exactly what types of jobs, how many could be “created” and at what cost, questions posed by Republican Councilmember Edwin Peacock, remains unclear. In that regard, the council directed staff to start working with the WDB to “find a new community framework to address youth employment,” according to Democrat Councilmember James Mitchell. Or in Foxx’s words, “to expand the footprint of youth strategies within existing resources.”
Yes, and when exactly was the last time government expanded its footprint, in anything, within existing resources?
Part and parcel of the expansion, the WDB will reconstitute its Advisory Council for Youth Services, with Foxx to serve as the “community champion for youth employment” to help recruit businesses to participate in the programs. (And how cool and convenient will that play on a campaign poster when your opponent is bashing you on job creation. Just sayin’).
The initiative approved Monday night also seeks to develop more stringent performance criteria for measuring results and effectiveness of city-funded after-school programming, a task already started by the ubiquitous Foundation For The Carolinas and myriad partnering agencies. The city this year contributed $1.24 million to six organizations operating after-school programs serving 862 kids, along with an additional $443,000 doled out through the Police Department for out-of-school time programs like the Police Athletic League and Gang of One.
On the jobs front, the $100,000 in redirected funds will be used as wage stipends to help bolster the Mayor’s Youth Employment Program and its Goodwill Industries-contracted Youth Job Connection. Last year, the city shelled out $108,341 for the Mayor’s program, which trained 223 youths and employed 165, usually for “short-term work experiences” that lasted up to nine weeks, at an average cost of $656 per job. The city paid $200,000 last year toward the Youth Job Connection at Goodwill, which trained 1,379 kids and employed 226, at an average cost of $885 per job.
Charlotte faces a crisis in youth employment, Foxx wrote in a letter to council earlier this year. Within the last 12 months, he said, the number of children living in poverty in Charlotte increased by 14,000 to total about 43,000. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for young adults is nearly 50 percent, and more than 50 percent for youths living in poverty.
“If those trends continue,” Foxx wrote, “the sheer public cost and lost economic value of this [youth] population will be crippling to our community and our economy.”
So naturally, the solution is government intervention.
Foxx said the number of job opportunities provided through the city’s youth programs should at least equal the number of youths that are arrested each year – about 4,000.
While agreeing that bolstering employment opportunities for kids was important, and voting to approve the action taken Monday night, Republican Councilmember Warren Cooksey questioned the approach being taken by the latest endeavor.
“The direction we’re headed in, eventually there might come a day when we say as government, ‘parents aren’t doing their job, so we should do it for them,’” Cooksey said.
“As a step toward this notion that a way to have a better, safer, sounder community is for government to do what parents are not,” he said, “is actually what this is a step towards and may be an experiment we’re considering.”
On Foxx’s youth jobs target of 4,000, equaling the number of kids arrested per year, Cooksey said, “That’s 4,000 kids whose parents are not raising them right. Because if they’re being raised right, they’re not going to get arrested.”
That sentiment drew the ire of the council’s Democrats.
“Behind what you’re saying is a level of evil intent that surprises me,” scolded Councilmember Michael Barnes. “While there’s some truth to what you said, it was almost an unnecessary comment to make.”
Mayor Pro Tem Patrick Cannon joined the chorus of Cooksey bashing.
“This is almost like trying to suggest that we’re about social engineering when all we’re trying to do in this situation is create opportunity, to set a good stage,” Cannon said.
“We certainly know and we understand that if we don’t give these youths an outlet, or try to create some level of foundation for them, that they could turn to a life of crime, they could become a victim of their own circumstance, or just go down any road toward mischief.”
Without government intervention, in other words, all is lost. Wonder how that would play for a campaign slogan?
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