Agencies Make Welfare Promises

Federal agencies last week officially pledged to hire more than 10,000 welfare recipients by the year 2000, despite plans to lay off current federal employees in many departments.

In a report to President Clinton last week, Vice President Al Gore outlined the plans each agency has drafted to locate, hire and train people off welfare.

"We know that to succeed our plan must have these four elements: leadership commitment, recruitment strategies, retention strategies, and the means to leverage our commitment with our partners in the public and private sectors," Gore wrote.

The Commerce Department plans to hire 4,000 welfare recipients to help with the next census. Their jobs will be temporary. Other agencies, including the Defense and State departments, will use the Worker Trainee Program, which pays participants $13,500 a year, to reach their hiring goals.

Several agencies have developed training courses for managers to learn how to address the needs of the welfare recipients they hire. The Energy Department will hold a one-day workshop for its managers. The Department of Labor has developed a training package for managers to use with their new hires and a general guide for agencies, Tapping a New Workforce: From Welfare to Work in the Federal Government. They can be downloaded from the Labor Department's Web site.

Managers will need to help former welfare recipients to help them find transportation and child care, Gore said.

The General Services Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services have pledged to find ways to help welfare parents, particularly single mothers, find affordable child care.

GSA has also advised agencies that they can offer transportation subsidies based on income level and welfare status.

Agencies are stressing the importance of mentoring welfare recipients. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will assign each new hire to a "job coach." The coaches will be agency employees from GS-5 to GS-7 who will develop training programs with their trainees.

Some federal employees have expressed discontent with the administration's plan to hire welfare recipients at the same time agencies are downsizing. The Department of Agriculture, for example, is set to lay off employees in three of its agencies, but it has committed to hire 375 welfare recipients.

Gore is encouraging agencies to urge federal contractors to hire welfare recipients as well.

Welfare to Work: Federal Government
Commitments By Agency