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Workforce Boards Creating Jobs: Workforce plus in Top 10
Underscoring the commitment of Florida’s entire workforce system to helping unemployed Floridians get to work, the state’s 24 regional workforce boards reported more than 25,000 job placements for the month of December 2011.
“We must ensure we are measuring the most important outcome as we work to improve Florida’s economy, and that is helping people get jobs,” said Governor Rick Scott, who has made job creation, retention and attraction a top priority of his administration. “The efforts of Florida’s re-employment system are essential to supporting a growing economy, lowering unemployment and securing Florida’s status as the top state for doing business — with a highly skilled and productive workforce and a leading business climate.”
The placements are reported in Governor Scott’s new Monthly Job Placement Report. The report was developed by the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity and Workforce Florida Inc. in response to the Governor’s call for enhanced measurement of performance outcomes in workforce development that bolster the state’s economic recovery and growth.
The goal of the report is to highlight and share job placement achievement so that regional workforce boards and other workforce system partners can identify and replicate best practices and strategies statewide that successfully help job seekers gain employment. The report data is another measurement demonstrating Florida’s economy is heading in the right direction, and reinforces the positive job growth shown in December’s unemployment rate of 9.9 percent.
“Governor Scott has made getting Floridians back to work the defining priority for his administration,” said Chris Hart IV, President/CEO of Workforce Florida Inc., the state’s chief workforce policy organization. “As the backbone of Florida’s nationally recognized workforce system, regional workforce boards and the one-stop career centers they direct are all laser-focused daily on connecting job seekers and employers. The boards are committed to our system’s mission to help Floridians enter, remain and advance in the workforce.”
The top 10 ranked regional workforce boards for reported job placements in December 2011 are:
- Pasco Hernando Workforce Board (Board Chair Lex Smith and President Jerome Salatino)
- South Florida Workforce (Board Chair Alvin West and Executive Director Rick Beasley)
- Chipola Regional Workforce Board (Board Chair Darrin Wall and Executive Director Richard Williams)
- Workforce Escarosa (Board Chair Jay Overman and Executive Director Susan Nelms)
- Workforce One (Board Chair Gary Arenson and President Mason Jackson)
- WORKFORCE plus (Board Chair Barb Edwards and CEO Kimberly Moore)
- WorkNet Pinellas (Board Chair Dennis Meyers and President Ed Peachey)
- Tampa Bay WorkForce Alliance (Board Chair Dr. Tony Leisner and President Ed Peachey)
- Heartland Workforce (Board Chair David Royal and President Roger Hood)
- Florida Crown Workforce Board (Board Chair Jennie Reed and Executive Director John Chastain)
View the monthly report and a list of Frequently Asked Questions. For more information on Workforce Florida or its state and local workforce partners, go to WorkforceFlorida.com. Please visit EmployFlorida.com to list a job opening or search for jobs and access a wide array of workforce resources.



