TWC
Published: 08-07-08
AUSTIN— In response to the damage caused by Hurricane Dolly the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) today announced that the agency has requested $7.35 million in Disaster Relief Employment funds from the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to provide 475 temporary jobs in Cameron Hidalgo Starr and Willacy counties. Disaster Relief Employment is the first phase of a disaster National Emergency Grant (NEG).
NEG funds can be used to provide wages and benefits to eligible Temporary Jobs participants to fund supportive services (e.g. transportation clothing and other work-related support) and core and intensive services to ensure participants’ reentry into the labor force.
Workforce Solutions Cameron and Workforce Solutions Lower Rio Grande the local workforce development boards funded by TWC will coordinate with local employer partners to help provide food clothing shelter or related humanitarian services. Other efforts will include performing demolition work and cleaning repair renovation or reconstruction of damaged and destroyed public structures facilities and lands located within the designated disaster area.
“Our primary concern is that the residents of these hurricane-affected areas pick up the pieces of their lives after the damage and flooding caused by Hurricane Dolly” said TWC Chairman Tom Pauken who visited the affected areas today. “TWC is pulling out all the stops to obtain federal assistance to jump-start the recovery.”
TWC will provide Disaster Unemployment Assistance (DUA) for those workers whose employment agricultural employment or self-employment was lost or interrupted due to Hurricane Dolly. In addition TWC and its local workforce boards will assist workers displaced as a result of disasters through mobile workforce centers employer assistance and partnering with local organizations to provide housing transportation and reintegration assistance.
The Texas Workforce Commission is a state agency dedicated to helping Texas employers workers and communities prosper economically. For details on TWC and the services it offers in unison with its network of local workforce development boards call (512) 463-8556 or visit www.texasworkforce.org.
