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Sonoma County, a diverse county of over one million acres is famed for its agriculture industry and recreation boasting a booming economy and a unique lifestyle for its citizens described by the same Luther Burbank as the chosen spot of all the earth. Sonoma County is the place

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to live, work and play as we move into the 21st century. Led by the forward looking philosophy of its governing bodies. Sonoma County's 340,000 residents are a harmonious, successful blend of ethnic and economic backgrounds. We invite you to take a closer look at Sonoma County in

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the nineties with your host Rich McGlinchey, how you doing everybody Welcome to another edition of Sonoma County in the nineties. On this particular edition of our program, we're gonna be talking about senior employment, both the urban aspect of it and the rural aspect of it. And

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our guests are bob Hastings and laurita Heinz. I'll introduce them a little further later on and we'll get into the program. But before we do want to call your attention to the artwork on our studio walls today and we'll tell you that it's by Nina J.

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Bonus. Now, Nina has been painting for several years actually the water colors and she does a marvelous job shows all over Sonoma County very, very popular. Uh, these particular programs, she tells me one was painted at my character beach that's just outside of fort Bragg and

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the other at one of its the winery vineyard I should say in Sonoma and uh, here's a shot of Nina itself. Who is the artist in question and does all this beautiful work we want to thank you once again for allowing us to display the paintings

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on the walls and we've been looking forward to having this with us on a series of shows soon. I don't think they're lovely. Beautiful. Great, great watercolor. Okay, let's get to our guests today for the program will reverse the procedure instead of ladies first we'll go

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gentlemen first bob Hastings is a retired Air Force officer with over 15 years experience in personnel office management and administration. He's worked with green thumb for more than a year and a half and he is the area supervisor for Sonoma, napa lake marin and Mendocino counties.

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Nice to have you here. Lorena Heinz, you've been with us once before. Back to Lorena is a graduate of humboldt State University with a Bs in social work and sociology. She's worked for art and the Senior community service employment program for over two years. She is

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now the project director for Sonoma County and it's really nice to have both of you here because the subject is important and senior employment is something that I think we should be stressing and talking about more often. Now I've got a number of questions jotted down

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here and I'm going to ask them and either one of you jump in so I won't ask them individually. Just the questions in. Gentlemen. You know which ones you want to pick up on. What is the Senior employment program? The Senior employment program is a non

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profit organization that is funded by the Federal Department of Labor under title Five of the Older Americans Act to administer community service and job training programs for the low income older workers. The older workers, that is those workers that are 55 years of age or older.

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Okay, now, if you don't have to think of something you want to add to the others, by all means do what is the main purpose? I just seems to be an obvious question in a way, but yet I think specifically it should be asked what is

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the main purpose of the senior employment program? The main purpose is to provide work experience to the enrollee to the participants of both of our programs at the same time. They're providing community service to our various nonprofit and public agencies here in Sonoma County as well

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as we also try to open up employment opportunities for our people on our program so that they can go off of our program into gainful employment where they can earn more money, which is really the main thrust of the program is to provide something temporarily and

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increase their skills and assist them and advocate for them while they look for better employment. Now, I know I haven't worked with bob's program, but I know your program because, well I was with the Sonoma County government. We had members of your Senior Employment Senior Community

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Employment Service program. That's correct title. We had people there and they were, they were wonderful. And they did a tremendous job of assisting us And that saved the county a heck of a lot of money. Yes, they did a great job. People are probably wondering, okay,

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what's the difference here now? So the question is, what is the difference between the two sponsors are and the California green thumb. The California Green Thumb was initially organized to buy the national farmers union to take uh, and help the displaced farmers. And so it is

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a rural program operates in 44 states, uh, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Uh, AARP uh, is a similar program that operates in the metropolitan areas. For example, laurita operates in the city of santa rosa and the surrounding community where I operate in Sonoma County in

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its entirety. I don't operate in the city of santa rosa. That's that's her area. And so we coordinate with that And I just, I stay out of the city of santa rosa. Right, right. One thing you want to add any of these, any of these things

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that you want to add to now? No, that's fine. He said it. All. Yeah. All right. Who is eligible to participate in the senior employment program. Any man or woman individual who's over the age of 55 who is living at or below the poverty level, which

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are guidelines are set by the Department of Labor and their federal guidelines and their low income guidelines. And there are a lot of factors that do and do not count towards their eligibility. So if someone believes themselves to be low income and they're looking for work

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and they need some assistance and they are over the age of 55 it would behoove them to contact either of our offices or both to find out what, What they can gain from our programs to see if they're eligible. It's not just, this does not include

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the illegal traders that are not making 500 million a year. They're down to 10 million. We don't know, these programs are strictly low income. So it's, it really is. And these, these figures, I might add are developed by the Department of Labor. Uh they are adjusted

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annually. In other words, uh right now we're looking at a, an individual that uh is making less than $8800 a year. And as Laurita pointed out, it's very important to contact us because there are certain types of income that do not count. And so we need

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to evaluate each individual on his own uh own income. And I'd really like to stress that how important that point really is because that figure 8800 is very low, especially for this state, especially for this county. And people tend to weed themselves out and say, oh

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gosh, I'm not eligible for that when in fact they may be. So it's really important that they really do call and find out. Okay, we will give numbers to at the end of the program will give numbers of both of these. But what kind of program?

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Well not program, what kind of work experience is available to those who enroll in the programs? Uh Computer operator, clerical reception, work teachers aides. Uh they work in hospitals as nurses, assistants, nurses aides. Uh they work for I mentioned teachers aides, they could be involved in

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landscaping, building maintenance. Um Let's see if you think of any others. Well, yeah. Um speaking more generally, we both really do our best to place someone in an agency where they can really learn some job skills that will enhance their already existing skills. Um The majority

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of my positions are clerical, most of them are clinically based, but bob covered most of the clerical maintenance drivers. We've got, we've got quite a few, but clerical is our primary thrust. We try to match the job with the individual. In other words, we we go

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through a, an assessment of their experience, what they've done in the past and then we try to find out what they would like to do and then try to find a position with one of the nonprofit agencies where that job training can be developed and, and

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job skills can be developed to where they can eventually, as laurita pointed out, get a job off of the program. That's our ultimate goal is to help them secure employment, uh, in the private sector off of the, the federal programs. This is a one that you

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want transition to know when we had the ladies that from your department down there. Uh, we did our best to, to familiarize them with how to deal with the public and in general as a public information office personality, so to speak. And they really became, we

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had nothing but compliments for the people. We had six or eight of the ladies were there over the years and some of them were transition, but they did all learn to do a tremendous, valuable service for the county of Sonoma. And I come into the program

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and I'm sure green thumb, which I'm not as familiar with and worked with us closely, but I'm sure that the success rate is, and those people inequality is just as great and it's amazing. You know, we, we, we have applicants that come in and they say,

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well, gee, you know, I haven't done much, I don't have much job experience, but it really is amazing when you place them in an environment, a job training program, how they all of a sudden find skills that they never realized they had and they really progress

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to the point where after months of training, they're ready to go out in the private sector and become a real viable asset to the community. One of the things that holds people back periodically is that they don't try or they have never thought of themselves, envisioned

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themselves as able to do something like that, but once you get a hold of them and put them over here and get them started, they take to it like a duck to one and it's wonderful. It really is. You see that progress, How are your enrollees

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paid? One question one and then a second one here. And how many hours a week do they work? Well, they're paid the federal minimum wage which is 4 25 an hour. Currently we are hoping that will increase. And um your second question was tell me again,

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number of hours they work 20 hours per week, no more, no less. And they're paid by the federal and then one on every other week basis by weekly bi weekly, which means every other week. Right? I'm saying semi weekly. Oh yeah, that's right. Alright. How many

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senior employment program enrollees are there in Sonoma County at this moment? Green thumb has 22 positions. Now these positions are determined by the Department of Labor. And just the process they go through is rather complicated. AARP AARP has 70 70 positions between the two of us.

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Yours are 70 right? Yeah. And yours are 20 to 22. So they were all talking almost 100 positions and a lot of people and certainly I would say to the, to the public in general, Those of you who are over 55 by all means contact these

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people will give you numbers later on if you are low income and if you do want to work uh both these people do a splendid job and they do find places for you. So do call them after. This is all over. If you feel that you

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fit in that category or as Laurita said, even if you think you might not call anyway, find out if there's a no let them give you the know instead of just assuming that okay. Um What are some of the positions in the community that are currently

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being filled by enrolling? Now? We touched a little on that earlier but let's elaborate. I have as I mentioned 22 positions I have, they work for the local senior centers. They work for the employment offices as clerical people. They work in Social Security offices as clerical.

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And uh that's an excellent environment because there's uh computer training there and the Social Security are are very very eager to accept the uh the AARP and the green thumb enrollees. They work as docents in the museums. They work as librarians, is assistant librarians, they work

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for um senior centers as outreach workers. Uh They work um for the various schools. I have several um uh people that are working for the uh grammar schools around the area. They work as in maintenance teacher's aides. Just to name a few of the positions. It's

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really similar. Um, the majority of our people are working in clerical capacities, supporting many of our nonprofits here in the community. We have a lot of people working for the county still. We have um, we have people supporting the meals on wheels program sponsored by the

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council on aging throughout the entire county. We have a lot of title five workers in those programs. We work with the food bank quite a bit. We provide them with drivers, warehouse workers and clerical assistance. We are, we're really active with just a myriad of, of

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agencies. A couple of questions here. Now you have 22 spots, You have 70 or is there does it look as though you might get more or not? Actually. We were decreased. Actually we were decreased last year decreased. Never really ashamed because that's something that. And President

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Clinton, if you're tuning in to this particular program, you might want to think about this, uh, put a little money and more money over there on these two programs because you really get great value received from these people or they've been taxpayers all their lives most

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of them and they are the kind of people that want to work and do wonderful work if you're given the opportunity. So a little more money in that program would help? I don't know where you're gonna take it from, but put it over there. Um, what

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is a host agency? I hear that phrase a lot. This is a nonprofit agency. It could also be a county or state federal government office who agrees to act as a training and work site where the enrollees are going to receive their job skills training and

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supervision. Uh They act as just as a normal employer. Uh They developed the work schedule with the enrollee. Uh The only thing they don't do is they don't pay the salary green thumb and A. R. P. Pay the salary. But the host agency has the the

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big responsibility of the actual training of that individual and the supervision. And we recruit these people, these various agencies. Um and we try to recruit as many as possible so that we're able to take care of the different job skills of the people that come in

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looking for work and we have to course spread them out throughout the county because we may have someone in Cloverdale or it could be sebastian pool and they don't want to end up having to drive clear to Sonoma. So we try to um find an agency

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right in their immediate community where they don't have to spend a lot of money and transportation costs. And uh it's an agency that's going to provide them some meaningful job skills training. Yes. It wouldn't, you know, if you're in that bracket. You've had tough times and

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your your income is low, probably driving an old car and the old car, it's a lot of gas. You got to drive 20 miles back and forth. You can pretty much eat up your, it doesn't do much. But um I really commend you both for these

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two programs because I'm a senior citizen obviously and I didn't get this, you know just accidentally. I do believe that more and more people out there do need this type of assistance. They're not making enough money to really exist well and are not well but exist

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almost. And if they were to find something along the line of the senior employment or income it really would amplify their income a little bit and would make their life a heck of a lot better. We're gonna pause right here and uh ladies and gentlemen are

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very important announcement coming up to the station and public service announcement after which we come back bob Hastings arena Hines and I will talk more about Senior employment Sonoma County. You can find it very interesting. So come on back prescription medicines work miracles. But did you

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know they can dangerously interact with drugs used during emergencies. Since emergencies can happen to anyone protect yourself by wearing medic alert. Medic alert. Let's emergency teams know your medications and medical history vital information that prevents emergencies from becoming tragedies to learn more. Call 1 800 I.

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D. Alert or ask your pharmacist, Welcome back to this edition of Sonoma County in the 90s. We're talking about senior employment, we're talking about it from the standpoint of urban senior employment and also rural senior employment. Our two guests are bob Hastings who represents Green thumb

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and rita Hines who is a member of art. And it's the repeat that the correct title of that little program other than Art. Well, the full name is the American Association of Retired Persons. And then what is the other subtitle here? It's S. C. S. C.

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P. But that's the senior community service employment program now that really is. Um I know, I know alright. We may have a little levity going here but I'll tell you one thing the subject is extremely important. There are seniors out here and there are seniors who

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do not have really enough income to live pleasantly. I don't mean luxuriously. I mean just get by. Not just exist but live. These people need to earn a little additional money. The two programs first, green thumbs under bob Hastings has 22 positions. And the art program

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under Llerena Heinz has 70 program positions. This is a total of 92 and almost 100 positions that help people. We're going to talk about whether there's any availability or I think but it's something I want you all to be listening to and if you think you're

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interested or you might qualify. You be sure to call these people. After a while we talked about host agencies and you told us what they were just before they left but how our host agencies chosen their chosen what I do. What I like to do a

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lot is if I get an individual in to the office depending on their needs and their past skills and their desires for their future job, then I really try to match them with the host agency. If we aren't already active with them, then I'll call them

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up and try to sell the program to them. And we work with just a huge variety of nonprofits and public agencies. And very often they'll call me, they've heard through a friend or someone they've heard about the program and they'll call me and say, hey, how

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can I be a part of this? And we just send them all the information and it's, it's a packet that we send out. They fill in the paperwork and we've got him on file. It may take some time to be active with them. But like bob

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said earlier in the program, it's really, really great to get as many as we can so that we can offer the participants of the program. Really good solid job experience. Don't forget Clinton heard just what I said a while ago and he's going to increase the

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number next year. You gotta be prepared for that. Thanks Bill. What are the responsibilities of this house agency? You've touched on a little these things as we go along, but specifically what is their responsibility. I think really specifically the strongest responsibility that a host agency supervisor

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has is to really provide some very good training, some real supervision and training. That is why a person is their supervision is vital. It's vital you know and and to really treat them like they are a regular employee don't, there's no need to treat them any

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differently. You know, we want them to be treated like an employee because the more experience they have at being a real employee, the more likely they're gonna go off and graduate and go into something better. This is probably the most difficult part of the host agency

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program is to to get them to really um exert themselves as far as supervision and training and act like a real employer. They sometimes want to back off and and just let the program float along So it takes uh attention on our part to make sure

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that we encourage them to uh of their responsibilities to get in there and really do the job of a supervisor. I should mention also there is some paperwork involved in being a host agency and a supervisor. They maintain not very much, but there is, it's their

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evaluation periodically because you want to know how are they faring over there And then an evaluation of the actual employees work in the agency. We had such good luck with the people we had, I never had, I don't think I ever had to submit a bad

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report. I really didn't because these people were always, they were older. They recognized the importance of working and they recognized the importance after we talked for them of what we were doing and how it had to be done and they did it. I did. It was

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great. Um, I know I know your participants in the program are encouraged to look for unsubsidized employment. I know they do that constantly. So I'm gonna go on to something else. Our employees employees, employers willing to hire men and women in this age group. I get

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calls weekly from employers who were interested in older workers. Uh I think one of the real key things with the older worker is that many of the older workers are interested in 20-30 hours a week. And a lot of the employers now are looking for those

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kinds of employees who are willing to work the part time work shift. And so this this blends right in with the, not only with the employer but with the employee. And we get, as I say, many, many calls for and then we work with different agencies

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who are interested in hiring the older worker also. And so it's a it's a very good program. I know the answer to this, but I want you to give the answer to the public in general. One of these people have to offer in today's job market.

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I think they have a lot to offer. They are coming from a lifetime of experience, They have sound judgment, their work ethics are quite different from the younger group these days. They are dependable, reliable and I think really judgment, good judgment and maturity really is the

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strongest, strongest asset they have to bring to an employer. I want to reiterate the good work ethics. I think that is one of the key factors in the older worker and their dependability, they are extremely dependable and they're anxious to work. All they want is a

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chance to show themselves uh and they'll become a over time become a very valuable employee. Well, as valuable as this program is You have a total of 92 spots. Do you have any vacancies at the moment? Yes, I also do, even though we may not have

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an immediate vacancy, we we do have preliminary application, we do an assessment of the job skills of the individual, we place them on a waiting list and we are constantly having uh enrollees leave the program because of maybe a job that they've received or through health,

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they finally just can no longer work. And so it could be a matter of days where we could put some of these folks right on the program. Well, now I know you folks work with the public sector because I have had experience and very good experience

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with that. Uh Do you also provide employment and training opportunities in the private sector quite a bit. Yes, we both of our programs have a financial incentive package to the private employer to the private industry. They vary just a little bit, but basically the primary thrust

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is that they provide, we provide the wages and the workers compensation during the training period and the training period is, it just depends on the job and the length of training time that's necessary. But we both do have opportunities for the private employer if they're interested,

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they should also call us if they have a bona fide job opening and they truly are interested in hiring an older worker. They, it would behoove them to call both of us and find out what we have to offer. How successful are your two programs in

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finding employment for your participants Statewide. Green thumb has uh averaged around 25% of our enrollees uh turn over into the private sector uh nationally. Uh it runs between about 20 to 23% around those figures. Mhm. AARP is a bit a little bit more successful than that.

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Just just a hair above that locally. We're doing very well. We've we've very, very much exceeded our regulations and um we're both required to to place 20% of our people, but we both successfully exceed that every year. Our time has flown, we need to give two

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phone numbers, we want to give the phone number of AARP and I know that is coming up here on our screen in a moment. The art offices. I know 5 to 5919 oh. And then we want to give the green thumb number and it's 763652763065. There

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it is right. Uh we want you ladies and gentlemen to use these numbers if you think that you would be interested and you qualify or could qualify for either one of these programs. By all means call bob Hastings and Rita Hines because the programs are wonderful.

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You'll get a lot of satisfaction and you will earn some money. I thank you both for For being my guest like to have you back again. My name is rich McGlinchey. The programs in the 90s. Back with you next week with a member of county government,

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family or related agencies such as green thumb. And until then. Good night. Good luck. Good health to each and every one of them.