Despite new money, state braces for summer job crunch

(Globe staff photo/Wendy Maeda)
Mayor Thomas M. Menino with UMass-Boston student Yorling Valdez today at press conference.

By Michael Levenson, Globe Staff

Officials anticipating a crush of teenagers looking for work this summer, as unemployment soars to its highest levels in more than a decade, are pumping $30 million, most of it in federal money, into programs to fund 10,000 summer jobs in 60 of the state's poorest communities over the next two years.

But with thousands already trying to find work and alarm rising that large numbers of unemployed teens could translate to rising crime, officials pleaded with private businesses to create positions. In Boston alone, the number of teens seeking jobs on a city hotl ine has exceeded the number of available slots by 4,000, Mayor Thomas M. Menino said at a press conference today with Governor Deval Patrick and a parade of other officials.

"We've got to work harder," Menino said. "The call is out to business: If you've got one or two jobs, we'll take them. We've got to make sure these kids are working."

Since the beginning of the decade, the employment rate, or percentage of people working, has declined broadly for Americans under 30, with teens hardest hit, state officials said. The percentage of teens working in Massachusetts is now at its lowest level since World War II, having fallen from 53 percent during a booming economy in 1999 to 38 percent this year and 21 percent in the state's poorest communities, officials said.

"I won’t say we're panicked, but we’re very concerned," said Neil Sullivan, executive director of the Boston Private Industry Council, a group led by city businesses that, in the past, has secured about 4,000 summer jobs for teens. This year, Sullivan is worried about matching that figure, he said.

"I don’t want anyone thinking this federal money gets us off the hook," Sullivan said. "We really need to amp up the appeal to small- and medium-sized businesses."

Officials pointed out that many young people won’t be eligible for the 10,000 jobs announced today because of the income guidelines. Some 3,500 of the jobs will be set aside for young people ages 14 to 24 from families who earn no more than twice the federal poverty level, $44,100 for a family of four, officials said. The remaining 6,500 jobs will be set aside for those from families who earn incomes at or below the poverty level, $22,050 for a family of four.

"The fact that we’ve got a boost for the very low-income doesn’t change the fact that we have desperate needs for private-sector jobs for others in the Boston public schools," Sullivan said.

Teens like 18-year-old Lawrence Lowery, a senior at City Roots Alternative High School in Mission Hill, are already discovering just how barren the job market is. He said he’s been sending out resumes and searching online and still has nothing to show for it. He rattled off the names of places he has applied, Best Buy, Target, Staples, Office Max, Stop & Shop, Shaw's.

"I'm really worried,” said Lowery, who has been accepted to Salem State College and is hoping to pay for his education. "I've been applying for the past two months and no jobs are opening up. It's tough. I’m trying to save up."

Kendrick Jackson, another 18-year-old senior at City Roots High School, said he had yet to hear back after applying for summer jobs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

"I’m trying to broaden my horizons," he said. "I want to use this is a steppingstone to build a career."

In addition to teaching the value of work, summer jobs are also considered crucial to tamp down crime during the traditionally violent months after school lets out. “It gets kids off the street, which is great,” said Mayor Scott W. Lang of New Bedford.

Lang said he has been worried about being able to secure the 550 jobs that he found for teens last summer. “The problem this year, in the downturn, is that many of the business that were able to offer jobs last year don’t have that ability,” Lang said. "In fact, they've had layoffs."

Two weeks, ago, Holyoke officials printed 600 applications for summer jobs for teens, to work at pools, parks and other locations. “In two days, we actually ran out of them,” said Mayor Michael J. Sullivan. "That's pretty incredible."

Sullivan said the city will provide about 600 jobs for teens, but will receive 2,000 applications, many from very poor teens. "It’s tough to get jobs for anybody out there, but these families really rely on it," Sullivan said. "They use that summer money to sustain them as families."

Revere officials managed to employ 80 teens last year by cutting the hours per week they worked from 30 to 20 and their days per week from five to four. They will do that again this summer and provide about 100 jobs. Even so, “there are always a lot of disappointed kids,” said Mayor Thomas G. Ambrosino.

The governor, speaking at a press conference with several dozen teens at the Mission Main Community Center, in a Boston public housing complex, said that his first summer job, working on a Sno-cone truck in the Chicago projects at age 11, taught him “responsibility, reliability, and independence.”

Those are some of the same values Lowery, the senior at City Roots High, said he wants to learn at his summer job, wherever he can find it.

"When you’re a teenager, the world of being an adult is not too far off, and you’ve got to get some life skills,” he said. “If you don’t, other people are going to beat you to it, and you’ll be worse off.”

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The Globe's Adrian Walker said in a column today that the program shows that the governor does care about the people of Massachusetts and the program is "a reminder of the man Masasachusetts voters thought they were electing."