Task force seeks volunteers

Members start honing recruitment

COLUMBIA BASIN — Allan Peterson's big worry is people might be thinking things have already been taken care of, so they stop helping out.

But Peterson, one of the committee leaders for the operations task force, and others involved with the group agree: Volunteers and extra help are still needed as the community works to recruit workers from within and outside of the Columbia Basin to fill industry positions, and find housing for construction workers.

At a meeting Friday morning in Big Bend Community College's ATEC building, various committees provided a group of about 19 people with updates on their efforts thus far.

Jeff Wiberg expressed a need for help with the marketing committee, and said he is in the process of weeding out redundant efforts between different organizations by working with various area chambers of commerce.

Wiberg has contacted about 20 businesses to gauge interest in a program to promote the Columbia Basin and its employment opportunities with a booth at career fairs locally and out of the area, with every one responding positively. He hopes to have the project up and running in about a month, he said.

The marketing committee meets April 6 and April 20 for strategic planning.

For the training committee meeting, Peterson said the group is gathering information about programs already in place which would meet the needs of the task force, including the Moses Lake Chamber of Commerce education committee's 6-year-old monthly Tuesday Tour program, which pairs up area educators with local business and industry to tour and glean an understanding of their operations, and the committee's teacher internship program.

A sample job opportunities worksheet was passed around as a recruitment tool. Companies would offer their job opportunities, ranking them in skill requirements from basic to those positions requiring extensive experience and a college degree. The worksheet would also include a salary range for the levels of positions.

Jonathan Smith provided an update for the database committee, saying he is working on a Grant County growth report for 2006-2011, which would focus on industries, occupations, demographics, the top 10 growing occupations and additional forecasted growth. The report would be updated every six months.

The report would be a tool in addressing high school students as they consider their careers, Smith said, noting the forecasted growth could be used to look at what jobs would be available in the years ahead.

Smith and Jim Flores, working on the REC Silicon expansion, provided a construction committee update. Flores said he has spoken with Pat Molitor, owner of several hotels in Moses Lake, to address the need for temporary housing for construction workers, but still forecast a need for a tent or trailer city. Smith said a list of available short-term housing is being compiled, as is a calendar for peak construction times.

Flores said the peak time for REC begins in May, with about 500 workers on site by June. In the fall, the project would amp up to 1,100 to 1,200 workers. Flores expected the REC project to be completed in March 2008.

"We're starting to see some meat and potatoes, some systems coming into place," Peterson said. "Tools to use we actually have that we can carry forward. We need to start bringing those things to the larger group, and meeting as subcommittees together to put things together. I believe if we can get that done, we can carry this more into the Basin, outside of Moses Lake and surrounding areas."

Big Bend Community College Assistant to the President Melinda Dourte said the group is opening up communication between different groups on parallel efforts.

"If they can merge that, it takes some of the workload off and it makes the product even better in the end," she said. "People are sharing information. The first couple meetings were a lot of brainstorming and now it seems like we're refining down and choosing projects which really seem like they can go forward."