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The tornado in Joplin left nearly 5000 people without jobs. KSMU's Michele Skalicky reports on how those people can get help...
Employees of the businesses that were damaged or destroyed in the Joplin tornado have a place to turn to for help.The Missouri Career Center in Springfield sent a mobile unit to the Missouri Southern State University campus Wednesday and has served around 30 people so far.The staff from the Joplin Career Center and Workforce Investment Board of Southwest Missouri started Tuesday helping those whose places of employments were hit. They’re helping people register for the state’s unemployment insurance program so they can start receiving cash benefits. Over the long term, they’ll work to get people back into jobs or put them in training if they’re going into a new career field.The board’s executive director Jasen Jones says currently there are four locations in Joplin where people can get help. About 300 people have been served so far…
"which is a number actually a lot higher than we thought we would serve initially just because of the nature of the rescue effort that still continues. We actually thought folks might want to wait a little longer to, you know, get connected with the Career Center and with the unemployment and so forth."
Jones expects more people to seek help in the weeks to come. He encourages those who lost jobs due to the tornado to sign up for services as soon as possible…
"cause, case by cause, it can take a number of days for unemployment benefits to begin, so we've encouraged them to sign up sooner than later so there's not a delay when they actually need that resource and they're needing to, you know, spend money on basic necessities and things."
The Springfield MO Career Center mobile unit is located at 3950 E. Newman Rd. in Joplin. The MO Career Center in Joplin is at 8th and Wall.
