ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, March 11, 1997 TAG: 9703110072
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR THE ROANOKE TIMES
President Clinton wants the federal government to put welfare recipients to work. But job prospects in federal agencies in the Roanoke area are slim.
Federal agencies in the Roanoke area don't have the jobs needed to adequately answer President Bill Clinton's call for the federal government to recruit and hire welfare recipients, some agency directors said Monday.
The jobs don't exist because of government downsizing, they said. And the nearly 1,700 welfare recipients in the Roanoke and New River valleys who will be required to work by this time next year might do better job-hunting elsewhere.
"We have been cutting back employment just because of budgetary pressures," said Rick Schroeder, acting associate director at the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Salem, the Roanoke Valley's largest federal employer.
Schroeder said the medical center has about 1,500 full-time, full-time equivalent and part-time employees, down about 200 from three years ago.
"We haven't gotten any instruction as to what direction we would be heading," Schroeder said. "It's kind of up in the air to say what we'd do. But being one of the larger federal employers in the area, we would definitely be an option."
In his weekly radio broadcast Saturday, Clinton directed federal agencies to recruit and hire people receiving welfare. He set no numerical goals. He gave agency heads 30 days to present detailed plans to him. Vice President Al Gore will supervise the effort.
Clinton's initiative was intended to encourage federal agencies to set an example for private employers, whom he has repeatedly prodded to hire welfare recipients.
Last August, Clinton signed federal welfare legislation into law, ending the 61-year-old federal guarantee of what was Aid to Families with Dependent Children and requiring most adults to work within two years of receiving benefits.
Many states have set stricter work requirements, including Virginia. Virginia's welfare plan requires most recipients to work for their benefits within 90 days of their locality's phasing in the plan's work component, called VIEW - the Virginia Initiative for Employment not Welfare.
On Oct. 1, VIEW will begin requiring 1,680 welfare recipients in the Roanoke and New River valleys to find work within 90 days. Recipients must work in paid or volunteer jobs to continue receiving their Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (formerly AFDC) benefits. TANF benefits will be cut off after two years.
Betty McCrary, director of the Roanoke County Department of Social Services, said local social services departments are in the process of assembling a steering committee of department directors, business people, citizens and elected officials who will work on a strategy to move people off welfare and into jobs.
The committee, in part, will help identify jobs for welfare recipients in the private and public sectors.
Fred Ayscue, district manager of the Social Security office in Roanoke, said Clinton's call to federal agencies was a noble act but making it work "is just a matter of fitting in with the present economy and jobs available."
Ayscue said his office has been cutting back employees for years - "downsizing before it even became popular governmentwide." The office employs 49 people, down about 20 people from 10 years ago, he said.
"As of right now, we have no positions open," Ayscue said. "We basically were told not to do any hiring this year. Whether that changes depends on the budget, depends on what Congress and the administration does."
The availability of jobs at the Department of Veterans Affairs regional office in Roanoke's Poff Federal Building "is practically nonexistent," said Andy Bryson, the office's veterans services officer.
"We're downsizing this year about 9 percent of our employment from the previous fiscal year," Bryson said. "And we are in fact expecting another substantial decrease in our employment for the 1998 fiscal year as well."
Carrying out Clinton's directive, without more funding for more positions, "is going to be very difficult," Bryson said.
LENGTH: Medium: 78 linesby CNB