Dive Brief:

• In Jersey City, NJ, Mayor Steve Fulop wanted to see more Jersey City residents and more minorities working on construction projects in the city, and he called on the Jersey City Employment and Training Program.
• Working with developers Kushner Real Estate and Mack-Cali and the Laborers Union, the program has devised a program that has two weeks of classroom training and a two-year apprenticeship through the union, collecting union wages for that time.
• The employment program is recruiting to fill 80 slots with minority city residents 18 or older.

Dive Insight:

Jim McGreevey, who once was New Jersey governor and now directs the jobs program, said the goal is to put people into careers, not jobs only for the life of the two projects. Fulop, the mayor, also has a plan to boost construction in Jersey City by granting longer tax-break incentives for projects in certain parts of the city.