Central New York’s job growth is the strongest in decades. In October, year-over-year job growth in Syracuse was nearly 2 percent, compared to 0.4 percent growth in the combined regions of Albany, Rochester, and Buffalo. While this job growth is an important indicator of the strength of our regional economy, it also drives talent challenges for many area employers. In response, CenterState CEO has targeted efforts to attract talent through programs like the Good Life CNY, and connect unemployed or underemployed individuals with career opportunities through Work Train.

It is not an accident that the fastest growing sectors of our economy — construction, health care, and manufacturing — also align with our workforce-development efforts. Currently, we are working with 53 employer partners across these key industries to place graduates from Work Train into career pathways. Employees gain the preparation they need to succeed, while employers get access to qualified workers, ultimately contributing to employer stability. Since 2014, nearly 1,000 people have been placed in jobs through Work Train. As of September, nearly 150 people have been placed at employers including, Loretto, Raymond Corporation, ICM, and HP Mile. 

In the coming year, we will continue to expand and strengthen these efforts, establishing new partnerships and programs in other high-growth industries. Through our work with JPMC AdvancingCities and other grants, we have identified opportunities to create work-readiness programs for tech-related careers, including digital customer service. 

Starting in January, as part of a larger Syracuse Build initiative, Work Train, Syracuse Educational Opportunity Center (SUNY EOC), and the City of Syracuse began partnering with Home Leasing of Rochester to support their conversion of the historic St. Antony’s school, located in Syracuse’s South East Gateway, into 54 senior housing units. Along with CNY Works and neighborhood partners, this team will work to ensure there is a pool of job-ready candidates from within the community to staff this project. 

As Central New York’s economy continues to grow, we are committed to ensuring this progress reaches all in our community. We encourage our members to connect with us to discuss their individual workforce needs so we can continue to convene partners around solutions that create access to good jobs for members of the community. To learn more about the program, contact Alissa Tubbs, Work Train strategic operations manager, at atubbs@centerstateceo.com        

Robert M. (Rob) Simpson is president and CEO of CenterState CEO, the primary economic-development organization for Central New York. This viewpoint is drawn and edited from the “CEO Focus” email newsletter that the organization sent to members on Dec. 19. 

So, who do you trust?

Do you trust the people involved in Jeffrey Epstein’s death? They tell you he committed suicide. Despite any number of bizarre coincidences that suggest he was done in by someone. So, do you trust the officials who tell you otherwise?

Do you trust your FBI? If you say you don’t, I can’t blame you. An entire level of top guys there have been booted. More have resigned under a cloud. You have seen any number of accusations of sleazy FBI behavior flung against the proverbial wall. Many have stuck. 

You maybe saw director James Comey on TV a few times. You maybe have heard him tell one story, then an opposite story at a later date. You maybe followed his convoluted reasoning regarding Hillary Clinton’s email problems.

You maybe read how Comey’s team gave unprecedented soft treatment to Clinton and her staff. Would you trust him again at the head of our FBI? Do you trust the FBI to give equal treatment to all under our laws? Will they treat you the same way they will treat a politician or big government official?

You know our intelligence agencies dropped the ball leading up to 9/11. You know they got wrong the question of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. You should know by now they were knee-deep in the sludgy surveillance of Donald Trump’s campaign. You maybe have seen former CIA director John Brennan openly lie to the public. (He totally contradicted himself on a few occasions.)

You may also remember that James Clapper, the former head of our NSA, assured us his agency was not collecting our phone data wholesale — until he later admitted it was.

So, do you trust the birds that run these agencies to always tell us the truth? Do you trust the intel agencies to get things right?

How about the TSA? The guys who check you through the scanners at airports. They miss about 70 percent of fake weapons. Undercover guys try to sneak guns, knives, and explosives through checkpoints. Try? Better to say that they move these dangerous items past the inspectors. But inspectors catch 30 percent of them.

Hey, this is a big improvement. Used to be TSA missed 95 percent of this stuff.

So, if I ask if you trust TSA to nab bad guys who want to get on your flight, what do you answer?

Then there is the IRS. You must have read or seen how Lois Lerner directed a program that targeted conservative groups. The FBI, looking into this, found a lot of mismanagement, etc., blah, blah. But it saw no political mischief. Oh no. And the IRS denied wrong doing. Lois pled the fifth before the House. She resigned and started collecting her pension.

The IRS also simply refused to cough up all kinds of information that would have made it look bad. It resorted to full cover-up.

So, what do you think? Trustworthy?

How about the Washington, D.C. bureaucracy? We see countless cover-ups. We see foot-dragging when agencies are ordered to produce documents. They take years to find emails or bits of info that would make them look bad.

Trust is an elusive thing, isn’t it? My friend, now in his 60s, told me he trusts no one. No one. Why is that? He is Jewish. “When I was a kid, at every family gathering, my relatives talked about the horrors Jews suffered in World War II. They talked about neighbors and best friends betraying Jews, helping to send them to the death camps. Do you blame me for trusting no one?”

Ronald Reagan told us to: “Trust but verify.” He said this when he talked about nuclear agreements with the Soviets. How ironic. It was an old Russian rhyme. “Overlay, no proveryai.”

Russia’s Lenin voiced similar sentiments. Brutal dictator Stalin built upon them. He said, “A healthy distrust is a good basis for working together.”

Yeah, nice words. But who in hell trusts the evil, lying, villainous, colluding Russians? After all, Stalin also said, “I trust no one, not even myself.”

Now that is more than a little mind-boggling. Trust me.

From Tom…as in Morgan.                     

Tom Morgan writes about political, financial, and other subjects from his home in upstate New York. You can write to Tom at tomasinmorgan@yahoo.com, read more of his writing at tomasinmorgan.com, or find him on Facebook.