Thursday, January 19, 2012

Thousands of veterans line up in Washington for job fair


Even before the doors officially opened at 8 a.m. Wednesday for an enormous veterans job fair at the Washington Convention Center, hundreds of job-seekers had shown up and were going through security, getting in lines and signing up for interviews.


“It was already packed,” said John Sepulveda, assistant secretary for human resources and administration for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Some veterans showed up at the convention center on Tuesday and were told to return the next day, he said

The Department of Veterans Affairs has been hosting a massive career fair aimed at getting former service members into the ranks of the newly employed. (Jan. 18)
The Department of Veterans Affairs has been hosting 
a massive career fair aimed at getting former service 
members into the ranks of the newly employed. (Jan. 18)

Army Staff Sgt. Adam Porras was one of thousands of veterans and service members who showed up for the VA-hosted Veteran Career Fair and Expo.
 
After meeting with a résumé coach, Porras waited patiently in the federal job center line, hoping to find an employer willing to talk to him about a job as he prepares to leave the Army. “With the job market the way it is, I’m not sure how it will go,” Porras said.

Porras, who suffered a traumatic brain injury during a 2009 rocket attack at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, also suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Porras’s service dog, Atlas, lay at his feet, helping to keep his owner balanced and calm.
“Were it not for him, I’d be running out of here,” said Porras. “It’s too big of a crowd for me.”

The large turnout, at least in part, reflected the high unemployment rate for post-Sept. 11 veterans, which stood at 13.1 percent as of last month.

About 6,400 jobs in the public and private sectors were advertised as available, including 800 with the federal government.

“The whole federal government is stepping up here,” John Berry, director of the Office of Personnel and Management, said during a visit to the expo. “It’s a phenomenal response — all the agencies are here.”

“We’re telling the federal agencies, ‘We’ve got hiring authority: Use it, use it, use it,’ ” said Mary Santiago, director of VA’s federal employment services office.

The departments of Defense, Labor and Homeland Security had job openings, as well as the Philadelphia police department and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.

VA Secretary Eric K. Shinseki said more job fairs will be held. “This is just one piece,” Shinseki said. “We’ll take lessons from this and go to other regions.”

As of mid-afternoon, more than 3,600 veterans had registered for the fair, and more than 2,500 had met with coaches to improve and create a new résumé.

At the halfway point, more than 1,200 interviews had taken place, including 830 veterans being considered by private-sector companies and 400 being considered by federal agencies.

Some in attendance said that they were frustrated by the long waits and chaotic atmosphere. Lines of a hundred or more people waiting to speak to résumé coaches snaked through the hall.

“You learn each time,” Berry said. “We learned we need more coaches.”

Dozens more job-seekers milled in the hallway outside interview rooms. Those chosen for interviews were taken behind drawn blue curtains on the second floor.

Janeka Jones, a 39-year-old retired Air Force captain from Stafford County, emerged with a job in the workforce management and consulting office at the Veterans Health Administration.

Jones has been working as a technical writer for a federal contractor but was worried her position might be eliminated.

“I was looking for some level of stability,” she said.

The DHS Immigration and Customs Enforcement table was swamped with applicants. “It was pretty hectic there,” said Chad Fraley, an Air Force veteran who flew in from Little Rock and received a job offer from ICE. “A lot of people looking for jobs.”

Not all were lucky. “Today was mostly unproductive, unfortunately,” said Farlan Bingham, a 35-year-old Army veteran who lost his job last month.

Bingham waited in a long line to speak to a résumé coach, but when he got to the front, he was told that he needed to print out documents. When he returned with the documents, he was directed back to the end of the line. He spent four hours in various lines, but in the end, he said, “I really didn’t get to talk to anyone.”

Porras did not receive any job interviews. A job fair worker was apologetic, explaining that there was a large backlog because of the heavy turnout, and assured him that he would receive a follow-up call.
“It’s still promising,” Porras said.

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Chicago Homeland Security Program Wasted 45 Million Dollars from Taxpayers

Project Shield was supposed to make citizens safer. But in the end, the $45-million Homeland Security program more resembled a disaster, wasting taxpayers’ dollars and failing to make a single citizen more secure.

The failed Cook County initiative was replete with equipment that failed to work, missing records and untrained first responders according to a report by the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Story Image
Project Shield was supposed to make citizens safer, but the failed Cook County initiative was replete with equipment that failed to work, missing records and untrained first responders according to a report by the Inspector General of the U.S. Department

Investigators visited 15 municipalities between January and June last year and found “missing records, improper procurement practices, unallowable costs and unaccountable inventory items.”

Project Shield began under the administration of Cook County Board President John Stroger. The majority of the work, however, occurred during the term of his successor and son Todd Stroger.

Installations began in March 2005. By 2008, complaints of mismanagement and fraud were raised, led by then County Commissioners Tony Peraica, Forrest Claypool and Mike Quigley.

In 2009, Quigley, then a congressman (D-5th), asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate, saying, “We have spent hundreds of millions of dollars across the country on homeland security. If Project Shield is any indication, we are less safe.”

Sen. Mark Kirk, who was then a congressman, joined in, complaining to Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano that money had been completely wasted and the department inattentive.

“A Google search of $43-million wasted should come to your attention,” Kirk said at a 2010 congressional hearing.

Among the IG’s findings: Cameras in police cars malfunctioned during extreme hot and cold temperatures, there was a lack of training, and the camera systems were never adequately tested.
IBM was the initial contractor for the first two phases of Project Shield. Milwaukee-based Johnson Controls was brought in for Phase 3. According to the IG’s report, from beginning to end there were technical problems.

Fixed cameras mounted on poles also were problematic, according to the report. “These camera often targeted police parking lots, streets and intersections with questionable homeland security benefits,” investigators found. Fixed cameras were even placed in police station lobbies.

Almost from the beginning, some of the 128 suburbs opted out after technical snafus. And in the end the IG found “32 never had equipment, 9 left the program” and at the end, just “71 have vehicle video systems.”
The FBI, according to sources, investigated, but no charges have been filed.

The report takes FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, to task for lack of oversight.
Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI) grants were funneled from DHS to the State and on to Cook County. The report concludes, “FEMA did not adequately ensure that the State of Illinois effectively monitored Cook County’s expenditures...”

And questions remain. “Both FEMA and the State need to improve the review process and perform better oversight,” according to the IG, adding proposed actions to better monitor how funds are spent “remains unresolved and open.”

What is no longer operational is Project Shield. New County Board President Toni Preckwinkle ended the program last summer after a very troubled seven-year history.

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Emergency Smartphone Apps

The following is a list of several emergency management related apps available free for iPhone, Androids, Blackberry’s, etc....however; there are exceptions where nominal charges do exist.

-Android disaster preparedness apps, click here
-Blackberry smartphones, click here
-IPhones,  App store click here

Once on the respective App Store site, simply enter any of the App Names to confirm availability.

This list has been created from your inputs, presented in alphabetical order and is meant to be vendor neutral — and — while these apps, for the most part, depend on the internet being available in any disaster or disruptive event, and therefore, may not be accessible during a disaster, — use these apps primarily as the proactive learning and preparedness tools that they are meant to be.

Apps:

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