“Displaced,” which sounds like something got lost, and “dislocated,” which sounds like something got broken, are words being used to talk about about 400 Amfac Sugar Kaua’i workers who – for at least another month – still have jobs. But,
“Displaced,” which sounds like something got lost, and “dislocated,” which
sounds like something got broken, are words being used to talk about about 400
Amfac Sugar Kaua’i workers who – for at least another month – still have
jobs.
But, in a way, the professional jargon used by unemployment and
employment services professionals and others interested in working with these
soon-to-be-unemployed workers fits the situation.
Their jobs will be lost,
and the workers will break off relations with their former employer, in many
cases after decades of dedicated service.
The main need of these workers
soon to be separated (again, sounding like something hurt or broken) from their
employer is jobs, said Gini Kapali, director of the county Office of Economic
Development.
“If you ask a sugar worker, what they want and need are jobs,”
she said. “I think about the family factor,” or what the family will do when
income from the sugar-worker wage-earner in the household dries up.
In
addition to the 300 workers, some of whom will begin losing their jobs in about
a month, there are 100 additional workers furloughed during the summer whose
unemployment benefits will expire at the end of this year if they have not
found other full- or part-time jobs, she said.
The county office especially
hopes those workers furloughed this summer make a real effort to attend one of
the upcoming Community Kokua Fairs and a job fair tentatively scheduled for the
second week of November, Kapali continued.
The Community Kokua Fairs are
scheduled for Oct. 17 at the Wilcox School cafeteria from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., and
Oct. 18 at the Kekaha Neighborhood Center from 5 p.m. to 8
p.m.
Refreshments and child care will be provided, and Kapali said affected
Amfac workers should bring along family members, especially if the workers
speak English as a second language or need younger family members’ help to
fill out job applications or other required paperwork.
The message Kapali
wanted to get out to those affected workers and the public is that the state
and county are working together, feverishly, to organize and deliver employment
and training opportunities for former Amfac employees once their sugar jobs
vanish.
The response from both the public and private sector, she added,
has been “great; like, it’s part of me, and I have to help out.”
State law
mandates activation of a rapid-response team, headed by the state Department of
Labor and Industrial Relations, when a major plant or other operation closes
down, like Amfac, Kapali continued.
The department, working with the state
Department of Human Services, will offer on-the-spot counseling, describe
available job training opportunities, employment opportunities and other
benefits.
“This is a coordinated effort between the state, the employer,
union and the community to help these workers in any way possible,” said Gil
Coloma-Agaran, director of the Department of Labor.
Tracy Hirano, head of
the department’s Workforce Development Division, sits on a committee with
Kapali, Clayton Dela Cruz of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union,
the union that represents nearly all 400 affected workers, and Elodene Moniz of
Amfac’s human resources department.
The committee has been meeting
regularly, with a goal to meet the employment needs of the workers, Kapali
said.
Where the November job fair is concerned, Kapali envisions certain
employers actually offering work to former plantation employees, and other
employers letting the impacted sugar workers know which specific types of
training they may need to be able to complement existing skills which may
translate to jobs in other industries.
For example, a heavy-equipment
operator from Amfac may need only a certain type of commercial driver’s license
endorsement to be able to operate other heavy equipment, say, on public
roads.
In addition to information on unemployment benefits and employment
training and opportunities, the fairs will offer information on health
insurance, financial services, social services and community assistance,
assistance with food, and help to cope with stress.
Computerized job
listings locally and statewide, career exploration and counseling,
employability and skills assessment, and tips for finding the right job are all
offered to anyone interested free of charge.
Job-seekers can also receive
free fax and copy services, and may qualify for free education or training
opportunities, and receive needed support services while searching or training
for a job.
The Career Connection Center is at 3100 Kuhio Hwy., Lihu’e,
across from McDonald’s, and open from 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. weekdays. Call
(808) 274-3056 for more information.
Kaua’i Community College, which has
experience in offering training for displaced and dislocated workers, is
mobilizing, according to Bobbie Bulatao-Franklin of the college’s Office of
Continuing Education & Training.
“We’re all pulling together to see how
we can help,” she said.
That also means lining up Ilocano- and
Tagalog-speaking interpreters to work with certain Amfac workers that speak
English as their second language, she said.
Bulatao-Franklin said she hopes
Kaua’i Nursery and Landscaping, which has a multi-million-dollar contract for
the Lihu’e gateway project near Lihu’e Airport, or Gay & Robinson, which
will soon be the island’s lone remaining sugar plantation, will be able to
absorb at least a portion of the impacted Amfac workers.
“We want to be
ready, so when terminations start taking place in November, we’ll be ready with
ideas,” she said.
The college’s Rural Development Project has federal funds
for training leading to employment, and John Isobe, the project’s coordinator,
said he hoped to meet with Amfac officials to learn about skills the impacted
workers might have or need.
Isobe’s idea is to look at each impacted worker
as an individual, and try to provide everything that person might need to
survive the crisis, be that stress management, financial stability, or a
combination of these and other needs, he said.
The college stands ready to
offer career training if the workers are interested in another field, or in
tailoring training programs designed to help those workers in need of immediate
employment, Bulatao-Franklin, Isobe and KCC Provost Peggy Cha agreed.
Roy
Nishida, liaison to Cayetano on Kaua’i, has emerged as another of the
coordinators of the state’s rapid-response effort.
County Council Chair Ron
Kouchi, in Waimea Thursday for a candidate forum, said he heard loud and clear
that the Kekaha and Waimea residents are worried about employment possibilities
after Amfac Sugar Kaua’i’s demise.
The best immediate way to provide jobs
is to use the fertile state lands on the Westside leased to Amfac for
agricultural opportunities, Kouchi said. Because unemployment benefits for
displaced workers will expire six months after they begin, a plan for jobs for
the dislocated workers is needed within nine months at the latest, he
added.
Staff writer Paul C. Curtis can be reached at 245-3681 (ext.
224) and [
HREF=”mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net”>pcurtis@pulitzer.net]
Staff
Photo by Dennis Fujimoto
