ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, August 10, 1996 TAG: 9608120025
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
SINCE THE EARLY 1980s, job services and unemployment services have been managed separately. Now, both departments will be consolidated.
Bruce Johannessen has worked almost 25 years at the Virginia Employment Commission's Roanoke Valley office. Currently, he manages the unemployment services division.
But he has to leave town.
Reorganization has come to the job people.
Johannessen will become manager of the Lynchburg VEC next month.
Marjorie Skidmore, who now is head of job services in Roanoke, is going to be the only manager in the Roanoke office.
Since the early 1980s, most VEC offices have been divided camps, with job services under one manager and unemployment services under another. That will end Sept. 3, when the agency reorganizes into what a state official described as a friendlier, but more aggressive, operation. The new VEC will try to be easier for job seekers and companies to use. It also wants to be the main source for job listings in an area, said Dolores "Dee" Esser, new head of field operations in Richmond.
VEC now gets about 15 to 20 percent of the job listings, she said.
A new automated listing system and Internet access have improved VEC's position, Esser said. Companies now can post jobs electronically with VEC.
Staff will also be expected to have a higher profile in the community as a way to boost VEC's position, she said. Job descriptions have been rewritten, requiring managers to be more involved with local chambers of commerce and economic development groups.
"We want to put a really friendly, progressive front on the VEC," she said.
The redesign has been difficult, though. Incumbent managers had to reapply for positions, and there have been winners and losers. Managers who didn't want to leave their communities had two options: Win the top job or face a demotion.
Ralph Hicks, a Fredericksburg VEC manager who was also on City Council, lost a bid to head that office. He will have to take a demotion and a cut in pay or find another job.
With Roanoke's Johannessen moving to Lynchburg, the top two people there also face change.
Larry Barbour, who had managed job services, will become assistant manager. Roger Garrett, who had managed unemployment insurance services, didn't want to leave the area, so he didn't apply for any other management positions. He will take a staff job.
A similar musical chairs has played out in the Radford VEC office. Roger Frye, now a manager there, goes to Wytheville as manager. Frye's brother, Jerry Frye, is coming from the Marion office to run the Radford operation.
The Radford office will get two additional positions, however.
The salaries of managers who don't retain management jobs will be frozen for six months. After that, the salaries will be downgraded to the highest level of the work category, Esser said.
She said she doesn't expect to save any money with the changes because the management jobs in the large offices carry salary increases.
Even the job of field operations, in which Esser is new, is an example of the change. It combines two jobs.
The 39 VEC offices have been designated as either large, medium or small offices based on volume of business.
Roanoke and Lynchburg are two of the seven large offices, all of which will have assistant managers. The large offices and most of the 21 medium offices also will have two supervisors for job services and unemployment insurance.
In the 11 small offices, staff will fill in when the manager is away.
The changes at VEC are partly a result of the Work Force Transition Act Gov. Allen put in place early in his tenure, Esser said. VEC lost 11 percent of its staff because of it; it now is allowed 950 workers.
The reorganization was also an opportunity to provide better services, Esser said.
"We were not serving the public with two separate divisions," she said.
VEC offices will also be reconfigured structurally to create one entrance for all customers; most now have two entrances. Construction at the Roanoke office, which will include adding offices for a three-person regional staff, should be completed by December, Esser said.
The four regional directors, four marketing directors and support staff are now housed in eight separate offices.
- Staff writer Megan Schnabel contributed to this story.
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