This summer the Northern Kentucky Area Development District (NKADD) was awarded a National Emergency Grant for Gallatin, Carroll, Kenton, and Owen counties in response to the storm and flood damage those counties experienced in the spring. The purpose of the grant is to create temporary jobs for the local community while providing clean-up and restoration efforts in the affected areas.  In addition to receiving wages, temporary workers gain valuable work experience and skills that will benefit them in securing future employment.

For program eligibility, participants must be ‘laid off’ or terminated from previous employment and not receiving any other benefits or unemployed for more than 27 weeks. In addition to serving the communities, these positions will provide workers with a temporary flow of income that will help bridge the gap between employment opportunities.

Workers are typically placed on road crews or within the parks departments of participating counties.  NEG workers have been repairing and restoring rural county roads that were damaged or made impassible by the storm.  Workers have also repaired culverts, cleared roadways and ditches, and removed debris from public parks. Local counties were in need of the additional assistance this resource has provided. The local counties do not have the resources to focus on these clean up issues and maintain normal county projects without the availability of this grant.

The NKADD has employed twenty-five temporary workers for this project since June.  Of those twenty-five workers, three workers have already leveraged their work experience to gain permanent full time employment at other area businesses.