The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber has partnered with the Greater Cleveland Partnership and Greater Akron Chamber in Ohio and the Shenango Valley and Lawrence County chambers in Pennsylvania to build a list of companies within the respective region that are hiring and willing to offer work opportunities to displaced workers from General Motors Lordstown, Magna Seating & Comprehensive Logistics.
The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber has partnered with the Greater Cleveland Partnership and Greater Akron Chamber in Ohio and the Shenango Valley and Lawrence County chambers in Pennsylvania to build a list of companies within the respective region that are hiring and willing to offer work opportunities to displaced workers from General Motors Lordstown, Magna Seating & Comprehensive Logistics.
This list, comprising companies in both states, will be distributed to those employees who may be looking for other employment and can fill available positions.
Nick Santucci, director of Education & Workforce Development at the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber, said, “Hopefully, this document will act as a resource to those individuals who have been hit by this unfortunate circumstance. The chambers in northeast Ohio and western Pennsylvania recognize the importance of keeping our citizens active in the workforce and encouraging them to stay in the metro area."
He went on to say that the list is just a sampling of employment opportunities in the region. The chamber included a larger footprint since all of the displaced workers may not reside in the Valley.
Richard Rebadow, executive vice president at the Greater Akron Chamber, noted, “We’re always looking to collaborate with our Metro Chamber partners. In this instance, we were pleased to support the highly skilled workforce of the Youngstown-Warren area and surrounding markets by working to reemploy the workers dislocated due to downsizing in the automotive industry. We’re in constant communication with the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber, so we were able to act quickly to present employment opportunities in the Akron area in an effort to meet the workforce demands of our regional business community.”
Sherris Moreira, executive director of the Shenango Valley Chamber of Commerce, added that she appreciated the opportunity to partner to help with workforce issue at hand. "To take a multi-regional approach to any of the challenges in our business community means that there is a higher rate of success for the problems to actually get solved. The more our chambers take a collaborative approach to our challenges, the better it will be for our entire region," she said.
When GM announced the elimination of the Lordstown complex’s third shift in late 2016, the Chamber also then provided a list of employment opportunities to GM’s administrative and union leadership to distribute to displaced workers. Through feedback from companies on that list and individuals who took advantage of applying for those available opportunities, the Chamber learned that many of the GM workers did secure new positions and remained in the workforce.
You can download the list here.
For additional information or comment, please contact Nick Santucci at 330.744.2131, ext. 1103.