DATE: Thursday, April 17, 1997              TAG: 9704170408

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LON WAGNER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   66 lines

WELFARE REFORM PLAN LAID OUT TO BUSINESSES

Help offered: 7,000 Hampton Roads welfare recipients, varied skills, limited work experience, transportation questionable, tax incentives available.

Those are the job candidates Gov. George F. Allen offered the business community Wednesday at a welfare reform luncheon organized by the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce at Old Dominion University.

Allen laid out the basics of his welfare reform program, then swung into a hard-core sales pitch.

Allen's welfare-reform program takes effect in Hampton Roads on Oct. 1. The program requires all able-bodied welfare recipients to work for their benefits. The program places a two-year time limit on welfare benefits - with an additional year of transitional help with transportation, medical and child-care benefits.

In addition, mothers are required to name the father of their children, so the state can go after fathers who are not paying child support. And the program will not pay additional Aid to Families with Dependent Children benefits if a child is born while a family is receiving AFDC.

Allen's plan relies on finding private-sector jobs for thousands of welfare recipients. He told the businesspeople who joined social service workers at the lunch to ``explore what you all can do in your business to help out this cause.''

``I'm not asking anybody to hire anyone who's not productive,'' Allen said. ``If that person doesn't show up on time, if they're not productive, if they're stealing, you should not treat that person any different than anybody else.''

But Allen was asking for help. He described the speech as a ``pep rally,'' but he also tried using some business-to-business peer pressure.

Computer maker Gateway 2000, Allen said, has hired 95 former welfare recipients and 205 low-income workers.

Allen urged business leaders to seek out social services workers after the speech and let them know what kind of workers businesses may be looking to hire.

Suzanne Puryear, Norfolk's director of human services, did get a business card from a Lafayette Villa Health Care representative who said they had some job openings.

Both Puryear and Eleanor Bradshaw, executive director of Norfolk Works Inc., said they have to educate and train welfare recipients before placing them in jobs. Businesses might try hiring the workers once, but it could be a short-lived effort if they discover the workers are unprepared, Bradshaw said.

``It's very important to establish credibility,'' Puryear said, ``so the business folks know I'm not just going to place anybody.''

Norfolk Works has educated and trained about 800 welfare and low-income people in the past two years, and placed about half of them in jobs, Bradshaw said.

Norfolk has about 2,800 welfare recipients who need to find jobs, Puryear said, and that will probably happen one or two jobs at a time - not 50 or 100 at a time.

The task won't be over once they find jobs for welfare recipients. Social service workers will have to keep track of the newly employed and see if they need more skills that can allow them to be promoted.

``We'll have to work on job upgrade so you just don't put people in a dead end,'' Puryear said. ``You don't want to move 2,800 people off the welfare rolls and into the working poor.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

Gov. George F. Allen KEYWORDS: WELFARE REFORM

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