A former long-time Minocqua area resident is an assistant Deputy Secretary at the state Department of Workforce Development. He thinks there soon will be more workers to help fill a jobs gap for skilled manufacturers.
David Anderson was in the Northwoods recently to let businesses know more training money soon will be available through the "Fast Forward" program...
".....we're in town to talk about that. We're actually in the third round of grant application for that program. We're trying to let as many businesses know that there is some assistance to meet their targeted training needs...."
Fast Forward funds training at places like technical colleges where specific job training in taught. The training also is used to fund current workers upgrading their skills. It's a match program for the employer and is reimbursable once certain milestones in the contract are achieved. Anderson says the program has specific numbers of workers that need to be hired to hit the contract target...
".....a lot of workforce training programs have been 'train and pray' programs where you train somebody and they you pray they get a job after the training. With this program, the employer makes a commitment to hire 85 percent of the trainees. So it's a 'train and pay' program..."
Anderson says Nicolet College received $1.9 million dollars focusing on welding, and electo-mechanical, IT, health care and several other areas where there were students on waiting lists for high-demand jobs.
Fast Forward was part of the Walker Administration's Blueprint For Prosperity unveiled last January.
