Local News in Brief : Aid for Tongans Approved
The Board of Supervisors has awarded a $10,000 contract for South Bay family counseling and job-placement services for immigrants from Tonga, a group of islands in the South Pacific.
The program for low-income or unemployed Tongans will be offered by Special Services for Groups at the Asian Pacific Community Service Center in Gardena.
The board also nullified a previous contract with the National Tongan Organization, which had run a similar counseling service in Inglewood since 1980 but had dissolved in September.
About 22,000 Tongans live in Los Angeles County, most of them in Inglewood, Hawthorne, Lawndale, Gardena and the Long Beach area, according to a recent study by the Samoan Federation.
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