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Support systems
Georgia programs help workers look past loss of manufacturing jobs
News that Ford Motor Co. plans to close its Hapeville plant this fall was the latest in a string of bleak manufacturing announcements in Georgia. About 2,100 Hapeville workers will lose their jobs, and 3,100 employees will be displaced when General Motors shuts down its Doraville operation. Kraft Foods' plans to let go of 8,000 workers may put an additional 1,300 Georgia jobs in jeopardy.
"We've been bleeding manufacturing jobs for some time now in Georgia. We've seen thousands of textile industry and, now, auto manufacturing jobs lost to cheaper labor overseas," said Michael L. Thurmond, Georgia Department of Labor commissioner.
"What we're losing is a way of life, a path to the middle class. That's what is being lost in this country.
"Many of the workers in Hapeville and Doraville are third-generation employees.
They've worked hard, have great work ethics and skills, and they'll find jobs. Our biggest challenge at the Labor Department is to help them replace the wages they've lost. It's a quality-of-life issue."
The state's challenge is to help workers retool their skills and rethink their direction in an environment where manufacturing is changing, traditional employment opportunities are drying up and training beyond a high school education is preferred.
Fortunately, Georgia has a Plan B.
"We're the first responders when it comes to massive layoffs," Thurmond said. "We're very proud of our Rapid Response teams that can move quickly with resources to help encourage workers to move forward and be proactive about their future. They may be losing a job, but we can't let them lose hope."
Since the late 1980s, Georgia's Labor Department Rapid Response teams have worked with companies facing layoffs or closings to ease worker transition.
"We take work with our community partners to bring the resources to them," said Glenn Collins, Labor Department assistant commissioner for employment services. Depending on what the company needs and wants, Labor Department teams can provide a variety of on-site services, including unemployment-insurance registration, assistance with job searches and education/training options.
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"For people who have been out of the job market a long time, a high level of anxiety can create barriers to keep them from feeling confident about an employment search," Collins said. "We try to address all the issues that might be on their minds and work through their needs." General information sessions and individual counseling are available.
"Many of these workers will be facing a career change, and we can help them develop a plan and provide benchmarks to work toward long before they are laid off," he said. "The earlier they start, the more successful they'll be in getting back to work sooner or into a training program."
Because of the Southside's tremendous job losses, the Labor Department is setting up a transitional center with services to help displaced workers from Delta Air Lines, Fort McPherson, Fort Gillem and Ford. They'll find job-search support and hear about innovative employment strategies, such as Georgia Works, a Labor Department program that allows laid-off workers to get on-the-job training from a potential employer while receiving unemployment benefits.
"Our Rapid Response approach has been successful and productive, and other states have studied it. We're a leader in helping people get back to work," Collins said.
The Labor Department helped 76.7 percent of its job-seeking clients find jobs between July 2003 and May 2004.
The Georgia Department of Economic Development approaches the problem differently.
"We're working every day to entice new manufacturers to locate in Georgia, and we've had a number of smaller, new manufacturing announcements," said spokesman Bert Brantley. "Manufacturing is not in the tank, but it is in transition. We're seeing a changing dynamic in the way companies build things."
Nationally, manufacturing employment is predicted to remain stable over the next 10 years, but the trend is toward smaller, high-tech operations that can adapt quickly, rather than mega-industrial plants.
Georgia's logistics are attractive to manufacturers, Brantley said. Its transportation system includes one of the country's largest airports, the fast-growing port of Savannah, and good rail and interstate arteries. The state is already a distribution hub, and more manufacturers are locating near their distribution centers.
Other advantages include Georgia's 34 technical colleges to train a skilled work force and its HOPE grant (not to be confused with the HOPE scholarship), which pays for technical certificate and diploma programs for most Georgia residents.
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"The vast majority of new jobs are being created in small businesses, and it's likely that we'll see some displaced manufacturing workers become entrepreneurs based on their skills and hobbies," Brantley said. In that case, the governor's Entrepreneur and Small Business Office can help.
A cutting-edge resource for companies and manufacturing workers who need to retrain is the state's new Center of Innovation for Manufacturing Excellence, which opened Feb. 3 on Lanier Technical College's campus in Oakwood. Established through a governor's office initiative, the center brings the resources of education, government and private industry together to focus on advanced manufacturing processes that will give Georgia an edge.
"We opened Friday with more than 150 manufacturers from around the state present, and by Monday we were offering a class in programmable logic control electronics," said Russell Vandiver, vice president of economic development at Lanier Tech and the center's executive director.
The $3.2 million facility features robotic and advanced computer-integrated manufacturing equipment. Vandiver plans to make it self-sustaining within three years by charging Georgia's companies to train their employees.
"I believe totally in manufacturing. It's one of the few ways to create wealth, but the new jobs are going to be higher-skilled and higher-paid," he said. "Companies are spending millions every year to retrain their workers. Why should they send them out of state when we can do it here?"
The center also is open to individuals, and Vandiver expects to see some former GM and Ford workers. His secondary mission is to bring in high school students to show them what manufacturing is like today.
"I'm concerned about the dropout rate and students who are losing productive years of their lives because they can't see the relevance of what they're learning to future employment," he said.
At Lanier Tech, he sees graduates of one-year diploma programs get career-path jobs that pay $40,000 to $50,000.
"My hope is that, 10 years from now, we'll be able to look back and see that this center really made a difference to manufacturing in Georgia," he said.
