With The Start Of Summer, Unemployment Help Starting To Take Shape In AC

By David Madden 

ATLANTIC CITY (CBS) -- As the Jersey shore prepares for another summer season, Atlantic City and South Jersey continues to wrestle with massive unemployment in the wake of last year's closure of four casinos.

But programs in place to help are beginning to bear fruit, with the help of a $29 million federal grant.

There are a number of job training programs in place, but they only go so far. Just ask Mayor Don Guardian.

"They completed their training and at the end we had no jobs for them. So what was the whole purpose for this if we couldn't place them?"

The federal labor department grant is seed money to not just pay for training, but to coordinate that training for specific jobs, mostly in the private sector.

State labor officials say hundreds of people have already gotten new jobs through this program. Eight hundred jobs are now available, according to Guardian, with another 300 in the pipeline. And with city and school layoffs pending here, this program will help on those fronts as well.

In:
• Atlantic City
• New Jersey
• Unemployment