Federal Cuts May Derail Summer Jobs for Youths

Federal budget cuts are threatening to derail a Ventura County jobs program that has provided steady work to about 1,000 disadvantaged youngsters during the long, hot summer months.

The summer youth employment program--a nationwide campaign to put low-income teens to work when they are out of school--has been targeted for elimination by Congress but remains snarled in the ongoing federal budget battle.

While there is hope of restoring at least partial funding, the agency that runs Ventura County’s program began informing employers this week that the effort is in jeopardy. At the same time, county jobs officials began fashioning a plan to recruit employers to help put youngsters to work over the summer, with or without the federal program.

“We want to get employers, to the degree they are able, to engage in summer youth employment even if there will be no funding,” said Bruce Stenslie, acting director of the county’s Workforce Development Division. “I can’t think of a better way to engage youths over those three months.”

For at least the past two decades, some version of the summer jobs program has existed in Ventura County. From Ojai to Simi Valley, youngsters have earned minimum wage clearing trails, doing clerical work at city halls and helping out at local libraries.

After the Los Angeles riots of 1992, federal funding for the program skyrocketed, topping out last summer at nearly $3 million for Ventura County. That money put 953 youngsters to work at about 700 job sites countywide.

But now, with memories of that inner-city uprising quickly fading and a budget battle still raging in Washington, county officials are preparing for at least a 25% cut in the jobs program, if not its total elimination.

Both prospects worry county officials and employers who supplied summer jobs, which went a long way toward keeping kids off the streets and out of trouble when school was out.

“How can we show youngsters how to become responsible, in terms of job skills and learning to be good employees, if we’re not setting it up to teach them those things?” asked Francisco Dominguez, executive director of El Concilio del Condado de Ventura. The Oxnard-based Latino advocacy group employed 10 teens through the program last summer.

“We say we’re concerned about what’s going on with youth today, but we’re not giving them any alternatives,” he added. “If we are really concerned, why are we taking these opportunities away from them?”

Those opportunities aren’t gone yet. Although the 1996 fiscal year ends Sept. 30, funding for some federal agencies--including the Labor Department, which provides the summer job money--has yet to be approved. Before going on its Easter break, Congress took no final action on those budgets.

Still, Ventura County employers are bracing for the worst.

“I think it would be a great loss to the community,” said Don Reynolds, administrative services manager for the city of Moorpark, which last summer employed eight youngsters as clerks, janitors and counselors at a day-care camp.

“I’ve had some extremely rewarding experiences,” Reynolds said. “And I think it does wonders for their self-esteem.”

Ed Tumbleson, a senior deputy with the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, put some youngsters to work at the Moorpark station a couple of summers ago.

“If the federal government doesn’t do it, I really think that the communities--local governments and private industry--need to really get these kids involved,” he said. “We need to take them under our wing and give them a summer of training.”

That’s what Stenslie wants, too. Through the county’s Workforce Development Division, he envisions a summer jobs program where employers take a greater responsibility for hiring youngsters and giving them real work experience to prepare them for the future.

“We don’t want to be throwing youths at employers just to provide free labor,” said Stenslie, who in the next few weeks will approach employers who have participated in the program and ask them to continue. “We want it to be an exchange, where an employer is going to be giving an orientation to the full experience of the world of work.”