Hanover Park wants to open outreach center

When the unemployment rate spiked to nearly 17 percent in February on the Cook County side of Hanover Park, Mayor Rod Craig's first instinct was to reach out to the three community colleges that serve the village.

He says he figured Harper College, Elgin Community College and College of DuPage would best be able to implement initiatives aimed at training residents and getting them back to work.

After meeting with college leaders, Craig envisions opening up an outreach center in town so that the trio, in conjunction with Illinois WorkNet, which is sponsored the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, would come and provide those services.

He's currently on the lookout for a location.

"It seems as though any door I knock on, there's somebody who's been laid off or is experiencing reduced work," Craig said. "People are sharing with me they have great fears about the future."

A main goal would be to improve access to individuals who live on the outskirts of a college district and have no way of commuting upward of 15 miles to campus.

"It's kind of a sticky wicket because we all share a little piece of Hanover Park but none of us really own it," Harper College spokesman Phil Burdick said. "Most residents (in Hanover Park) don't even know what district they live in. We're talking about what's feasible to improve that access."

Craig has met with Harper President Ken Ender, ECC President David Sam and representatives of COD to discuss the situation, and on July 1 he put together a community development work force summit that drew all three schools, major local employers, state Rep. Fred Crespo and state work agencies.

Talk of opening an outreach center is still in the early stage, but representatives from each school say the summit allowed business leaders to learn about training options that already exist.

"Say FujiFilm (host of the summit) needs English as a Second Language training for eight employees. We bring it to them," said Susan Van Weelden, ECC director of community engagement and economic development. "And we work to find grants so that up to 50 percent of the training can be subsidized."

The colleges also made clear that borders don't really matter as long as a resident isn't looking to take a for-credit class. Van Weelden said Hanover Park officials were surprised to learn that ECC offers employment services at Streamwood village hall.

"The summit was an exciting first step for Hanover Park's area employers to understand what the local resources are," COD spokesman Joe Moore said.

Craig hopes the outreach center will become a reality, even though the most recent numbers show improvement in the town's job picture. The Illinois Department of Employment Security reported May unemployment rates of 11.9 percent in the Cook County side of Hanover Park and 10.4 percent on the DuPage County side.