“We’re finding that the youth who were in employment-training programs, now they’ve gotten laid off, so they’ve lost their only source of income, but they’re not available for unemployment,” Kramer said.
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Lindy’s Bakery, Daybreak’s job-readiness program for its clients, has halted production for safety and health reasons. Lindy’s, a dog treat bakery, is meant to train Daybreak’s clients for full-time employment when they leave Daybreak, said Joan Schiml, the chief development officer at Daybreak.
Many youth who use Daybreak’s services were working either full- or part-time at Lindy’s.
When open, Lindy’s employs about 30 youth and several temporary workers from Crown Personnel at any given time, Schiml said. In a year, Lindy’s employs about 95 people.
Daybreak clients who worked at Lindy’s were paid through the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA). This is a statewide program that works to increase opportunities for people with barriers to employment, like homelessness.
Michael Zimmerman, spokesman for Montgomery County’s Business Services, said the younger workers at Lindy’s were not technically employees of the bakery, because they were being paid through WIOA, so they are not eligible for Ohio’s unemployment benefits.
“Lindy’s was serving as a ‘work site’ for them for this program,” Zimmerman said. “So everything was being paid as this work-experience program to them, so when Lindy’s closed down, they weren’t being paid by Lindy’s, so they’re not eligible (for unemployment) because they don’t meet the requirements.”
The WIOA funds that paid workers at Lindy’s Bakery are managed by the Urban League, Schiml said. Since, the workers are not eligible for unemployment benefits through WIOA, any gaps can be filled by the Urban League.
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Schiml said it is still unclear if the Urban League will continue to pay Lindy’s workers or not.
“Everything is in limbo,” Schiml said.
The Urban League could not be reached for comment on this story.
Zimmerman said the county is still looking to place the young workers at Lindy’s somewhere else while the bakery is shut down. Zimmerman said if any business that is still open would be willing to take on some of the youth from this program, they should call the county’s Youth Services Department at (937) 224-1482.
“Our kids are pretty scared about being in that limbo right now,” Schiml said. “But they are concerned about their health first, and they’re not any different that anyone else who has lost their job in that regard. This is just another part of their case management, whether it’s connecting them to state unemployment or we’re helping them financially on an individual basis.”
Schiml said all youth are in touch with their Daybreak employment specialists to talk through how the unemployment will effect them.
“We have not heard of any youth finding a different source of employment as of yet, but know one person has contacted Crown Personnel about being placed. That’s all we know at this time,” Schiml said.
Young adults in the YouthBuild Dayton program are also paid through the WIOA. YouthBuild Dayton gives local young adults work experience and a chance to finish their high school education or get a general equivalency degree. The WIOA funds that pay YouthBuild participants are managed by Yes for Youth.
Jerry Farley, the director of YouthBuild Dayton, said the program is on spring break this week, so he and his team have about a week to figure out where they might place some of their students, or if they might still get paid.
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“If the lock down continues (past April 6) and if places for the kids to volunteer become more scarce, I don’t know where we’re going to be able to send our youth to get workforce experience,” Farley said. “We’re not the only ones though, the whole country is trying to figure out what to do right now.”
Farley said he hopes to devise a plan by the end of YouthBuild’s spring break this week that will allow students to continue getting work experience. YouthBuild participants will still continue to get educational credits during the governor’s stay-at-home order.
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