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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Odds Are Long Against NY Youth Seeking Summer Employment

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Tuesday, June 22, 2010   

NEW YORK - Experts say summer jobs teach young people how to be responsible, and this year landing a state-funded summer job in New York is also going to take a good deal of luck. Governor David Paterson initially eliminated state funding for the summer jobs program, but lawmakers fought back last week and restored just over $15 million.

John Albert, who is vice-president for external relations with the After-School Corporation, says that funding is a start, but it represents only about half the amount of state money that was available last year. He says that leaves a large gap, with available jobs being filled by lottery as of today.

"There have been 143,000 applicants for 34,000 slots; roughly you have a one-in-four chance of getting a job, and so we just anticipate that many, many young people are going to be disappointed through this lottery process."

Last summer the national youth unemployment rate topped 26 percent, and Gigi Li, co-director of the Neighborhood Family Services Coalition, says that's worse than the rate was during the Great Depression. Li expects things will go from bad to worse in New York, this summer.

"I wouldn't be surprised if that number were to move up, because there is the additional impact of the unemployed adults, also taking over jobs that used to be left for the youth over the summer."

John Albert of the After-School Coalition says New York seniors and young children will be also affected by the loss of these young workers.

"The young people who have these summer jobs are usually serving either the elderly or serving younger youth; so there's a two-fold loss when you lose these summer youth employment programs. There's a benefit to young people but there's also a benefit to the community that is lost."

Albert says there is still a slim chance Congress may provide an additional $75 million for summer youth employment in New York as part of the American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act. That measure contains $1 billion for summer youth employment programs nationwide. It passed the House earlier this month, but has been stalled in the Senate.


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