November 7, 2011, Jersey City, NJ — Two successful programs that train and place Jersey City residents in service-industry jobs are being funded to continue their work for the next year. As a result of the support of Mayor Healy and his administration, and the vote of the Jersey City Municipal Council last week, Community Partnerships in Hotel Employment and The Customer Service Skills Center will again be recipients of funding from the Jersey City Economic Development Corporationâ€s Urban Enterprise Zone (UEZ) Program.

 “These are two programs that not only provide the men and women of Jersey City with training, counseling, and skills, but they also place our residents in good-paying jobs and help them retain those jobs,” said Mayor Healy. “In turn, these programs are vital to providing the hospitality and customer-service industries here in Jersey City with the qualified workforce they need to succeed.”

 Funding appropriated for these programs came from prior collections made to the Jersey City UEZâ€s program. Under the UEZ program, shoppers who purchase goods from UEZ-certified retailers pay just 3.5% sales tax — half the normal tax — on most goods. A percentage of those sales-tax collections was returned to the UEZ program for reinvestment in programs and projects to strengthen the development of jobs and the economy.

 Jersey City Economic Development Corporation Chief Executive Officer Steve Lipski said the programs exemplify the progress and good that can be made when the public and private sectors work together.

 “Both of these programs have histories of success, and both are the partnerships between the Jersey City Economic Development Corporation, our Urban Enterprise Zone Program, and a number of organizations throughout the area,” Mr. Lipski said. He noted that both are sectoral-employment initiatives that succeed by learning the needs of specific labor markets and providing individuals with training that lead to good jobs with opportunities for advancement.

 JCEDC UEZ Director Roberta Farber said Community Partnerships in Hotel Employment (CPHE) is an initiative of WomenRising, Inc. in partnership with Hudson County Community College Center for Business & Industry and the JCEDC UEZ Program. The program has working relationships with forty area hotels, as well as Cruise Link, and several other restaurants, and transportation and housekeeping companies. Candidates for the program are recruited and screened by Jersey City Employment & Training.

 The CPHE programâ€s course consists of: industry-specific, job-readiness training; computer skills training; job placement; an internship; pre- and post-employment job coaching; access to additional educational opportunities at Hudson County Community College; and other support and life-skills services. The CPHE curriculum incorporates nationally recognized standards from the American Hotel & Lodging Association and the National Restaurant Association. CPHE participants who successfully complete the training may earn up to ten college credits.

 From 2000 to 2010, 231 individuals successfully completed the CPHE training. The cumulative graduation rate for the past three cycles was 90% with an 86% job placement rate.

 The newly approved UEZ funding for CPHE will provide training and services for another 80 individuals between now and November 2012.

 The Customer Service Skills Center (CSSC) services employers and potential employees by recruiting, assessing, training and placing individuals in long-term, career-focused jobs in high-growth sales, industries (customer service, retail, banking and finance, administrative, education, health, transportation, and security). CSSC is supported by partnerships between Jersey City Episcopal Community Development Corporation, Hudson County Community College Center for Business & Industry, the JCEDC UEZ, National Retail Federation Foundation, Jersey City Employment & Training, Hudson County Workforce Investment Board, Hudson County Economic Development Corporation, and the New Jersey Department of Workforce & Labor Development.

 The CSSC training is based upon the National Customer Service & Sales and Pilot Retail Standards. At the end of their training, participants are prepared to take a national certification exam. The program also supplies: money for transportation to-and-from classes and interviews to those students who need it; resume writing assistance; mentoring; and “interview” outfits from the Jersey City Dress for Success program.

 Since its inception in 2004, CSSC has provided training to more than 850 individuals; 84% of that number completed the entire training, 58% successfully achieved the NRF certification, and 65% earned a starting wage of $10-$12 an hour.

 While CSSC is intended to serve unemployed and underemployed individuals with at least an eighth-grade education, this past yearâ€s participants included four individuals with masterâ€s degrees, and eleven with bachelorâ€s degrees — which speaks to the current economic climate. The average starting wage was $11.32, but several graduates were placed in jobs with starting wages of $18 or more, and two were hired at annual salaries of $40,000 or more.

 The newly approved JCEDC UEZ funding for CSSC will provide five classes for several dozen more individuals between now and November 2012.

 

The post Jersey City Administration and Municipal Council Back Continuation of Funding for Two Highly Successful Job-Training/Placement Programs first appeared on River View Observer.

The Everything Jersey City Festival will Celebrate Community Pride and UEZ Support at a Time when Budget Cuts Loom

By Sally Deering

 If you don’t know by now, one-third of Jersey City is a designated Urban Enterprise Zone (UEZ\) a designation that offers local businesses tax and other financial incentives to help grow their businesses and stimulate local economy.  Sale tax revenues generated by UEZ businesses go for economic development and neighborhood improvements like street lights, paving, flowerboxes — and other programs that give constituents a feeling of pride in their community.

To celebrate the UEZ’s success revitalizing the Heights section of Jersey City – the neighborhood nestled on the cliff above Hoboken – the Central Avenue Special Improvement District (CASID) Management Corporation presents the Everything Jersey City Festival which takes place Sat., May 21st from 11 am-to-6 pm along Central Avenue from Congress to Hutton Streets.

The Festival will feature four stages with live entertainment including Queen of Freestyle Judy Torres who has made Jersey City her home for the past 16 years, has recorded numerous CDs and is an on-air personality on WKTU radio. Torres sings Freestyle, a form of dance music with a Latin influence that became popular in the late 1980s and early 90s and her hits include “No Reason to Cry,” and “Come into my Arms.” Torres performs nation-wide and just returned from a show at the Continental Airlines Arena in Miami. She has a huge local fan base and she’s excited to be bringing her show live to her Jersey City fans for a second year.

 “This is home,” Torres says. “Two weeks ago I performed at Michael Anthony’s on the waterfront; I performed at Pershing Field. There aren’t too many places in Jersey City to perform. When I did the Everything Jersey City Festival two years ago, we had a great crowd. It was a lot of fun It’s very nice to see people in the area coming out to have a good time. It’s a wonderful community celebration.”

Central Avenue will be lined with tables and tents featuring local artists showing (and selling) their work, vendors selling foods and crafts and of course, goodies from the eateries and stores that line Central Avenue. Arts groups like Pro Arts Jersey City, a non-profit community arts group that sponsors the annual Jersey City Studio Tour and Art House Productions, a 2,000-member multi-arts non-profit group are participating and several community organizations will present interactive demonstrations. Activities for kids will include a rock climbing wall, petting zoo, obstacle course, moonwalk and super slide. And for bargain-hunters, CASID has something very special planned: a huge one day sale among Central Avenue businesses (jewelry, clothing, shoes, furniture,) on the day of the Everything Jersey City Festival. Sales will offer 10% to 50% off select merchandise and festival-goers will find great bargains when business owners sell their wares at the Sidewalk Sales.

 “One of the reasons for the Everything Jersey City Festival is to show how great Central Avenue is,” William Clarke, Director of CASID says. “We try to involve our business owners as much as possible. It becomes a true community event. We focus on Jersey City-Hudson County based artists and we try to focus on the creative aspects of Jersey City. You’ll see things here you won’t see anywhere else. We try to make it as unique event as possible.”

The Festival’s mission is to prove the UEZ Program builds and sustains communities, but on July 1^st when the New Jersey State Budget is finalized and approved, community activities like the Everything Street Festival and many local non-profits may no longer receive UEZ funding.

“The status of the UEZ remains iffy,” Clarke says. “We won’t know for sure until the New Jersey State budget is finalized. But even if it ends in July, our organization will continue to exist. Sure it will change things, but it’s not the sole source of our organization. We’re an autonomous agency. We’ll exist no matter what.”

 When Governor Chris Christie released his budget, it called for no administrative or project funding for the cities, Steve Lipski, CEO of the Jersey City Economic Development Corporation says. That means there will still be a UEZ program, but no monies will be turned over to municipalities or the zones to administer programs. Businesses will still realize tax benefits but they won’t receive assistance from the zone leaders and municipalities through the monies that were collected from the UEZ and returned to the cities.

 But the fight to restore funding isn’t over, Lipski says.

 “We stand squarely with Mayor Healy in the fight to restore UEZ funds which are absolutely essential to help small businesses and fund essential projects critical to the city,” Lipski says. “Governor Christie sent in his version of the budget and the State Legislators are reviewing it to make their necessary input. There are budget hearings going on as we speak.”

 The end of UEZ funding would have a negative impact on community organizations like Washington Park Association (WPA), says President Mory Thomas.

 “The UEZ funding allows for festivals like these which brings thousands of people to the Heights and unites the community in a way that hasn’t happened for years,” Thomas says. “At the first Everything Festival, it was the first time I’d seen the community come out and be engaged in an event. For people to come out and enjoy being on the street, talking to each other and hanging out as a community, that’s something you can’t put a dollar amount to. What I would like to see from the UEZ money is more community-engagement activities.”

 The Washington Park Association along with the Riverview Neighborhood Association, the Jersey City Parks Coalition and St. Anne’s School will host a special “green” event in the heart of the Everything Jersey City Festival. Amid the urban landscape of storefronts, in the middle of Central Avenue, they will create a green “Open Space” – a little park with trees and plants and benches. And there’ll be a “greening” workshop for festival-goers, too.

 “During last year’s Everything Jersey City Festival, we decided that this year we would create an open space on the streets where the festival is,” Thomas says. “It will be a nice little breather in this concrete jungle we live in and bring people awareness to the issue of open space especially in Hudson County which is one of the most densely populated in the country.”

Along with headliners Judy Torres and The Black Hollies, CASID has lined up more great entertainment:  Celtic Cross, Celtic folk-rockers performing classic Irish music; Rumba Con Son, Central New Jersey’s hottest salsa band; Woodfish, a funk-rock band from the Jersey Shore; Ray Rodriguez y Swing Sabroso, a salsa swing band; Ed Solomon & Go Falcon!, poppy punk rockers; Lea Le Grace, pop-rocker; Stephie Coplan & the Pedestrians, a piano-driven pop-rock trio; and Catch Wild, alternative rockers from Jersey City.

 The Actor’s Shakespeare Company at NJCU and the Hope Center Dancers will perform and Family Fitness Martial Arts and Jang Star Tae Kwon Do will present demonstrations.

 The Black Hollies, a Jersey City-based rock band with psychedelic influences has several hit songs out in the mainstream. “Can’t Stop These Tears (From Falling)” was featured on an episode of “The Vampire Diaries,” and “Tell Me What You Want” was picked up by the NFL which used it for an ad campaign. The band features Jon Gonnelli, guitar and organ; Herbert Wiley, lead guitar; Nick Serrante, drummer and Justin Angelo Morey, lead singer and bass guitar. Several members reside in Jersey City, including Morey, who says the band has lots of fans, but may be more well known in other big cities like Austin, Texas, thanks to iTunes and YouTube.  “The song we did for ‘Vampire Diaries’ became one of the most downloaded songs on iTunes and YouTube,” Morey says.

 Art House Productions will be at the Festival to talk about their programs and Pro Arts Jersey City will be featuring several artist-members who will be on hand to discuss their work – always a fun thing to do at a festival. Who doesn’t enjoy talking to artists about their inspirations? Artists exhibiting for Pro Arts Jersey City will be Ibou Ndoye, Deirdre Kennedy, Christina Soto, Sharon Harvey and Holly Williams.

 Art House Productions, a 2,000-member multi-arts organization that produces visual arts programs for more than a decade in Jersey City produces on average one community-art event a week including JC Fridays – a city-wide happening held four times a year that presents art programming at approximately 40 venues. It’s a way to introduce people to the arts in Jersey City, Christine Goodman, Founder and Executive Director says, and each event attracts 3-5,000 people. But if the UEZ funding is cut in July, JC Fridays may not go on.

 “If UEZ funding is cut, it will have a huge impact on our decision to continue JC Fridays,” Goodman says. “We’d like to keep it going. We’ve faced this problem in the past, but it’s going to be a challenge. The future of JC Fridays is a little uncertain at this point.”

Designed to stimulate the local economy, the Everything Jersey City Festival is sponsored by corporations, local businesses, government officials, city agencies and non-profit community groups serving the Jersey City area including Capital One Bank, Christ Hospital, LibertyHealth/Jersey City Medical Center, Metro Honda, City of Jersey City, City of Jersey City Division of Cultural Affairs, County of Hudson, County of Hudson Cultural Affairs and Tourism, C-Town Supermarkt, El Sabroso Restaurant, Footprints Realty, Goehrig’s Bakery, Hauptman Carpets, Hudson County Community College, Infinite Print, Jersey City Incinerator Authority, Jersey City Independent, Jersey City Parking Authority, Milrose Consultants Inc, Panepinto Properties, PSE&G, Spectra Energy, State Farm Insurance, Stop & Shop Supermarkets, Susan Newman Design, Inc., The American Flag Company, the Hudson Reporter, Jersey Journal, Jersey City UEZ Program/EDC, U.S. Representative Steve Rothman, United Water and Wells Fargo Bank.

Things may change after July, but for now, the Everything Jersey City Festival, paid for in part by the Jersey City UEZ Program promises to be a great event that celebrates community spirit and pride.

 And with a little luck come July, let’s hope it won’t be the last.

  Everything Jersey City Festival

Sat, May 21,

Central Avenue between Congress and Hutton Streets

Jersey City

For more information, call CASID at 201-656-1366,or visit its website, www.centralavesid.org

 

For more information on the sources included in this story visit:

www.judytorres.com

www.theblackhollies.com

www.arthouseproductions.org

www.proartsjerseycity.org

www.wpanj.org

www.jcedc.org

The post Jersey City’s Got Everything -For Now first appeared on River View Observer.

Fun Day Out in the  Jersey City Heights

Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy proudly posses with two Jersey City residents at the Everything Jersey City Festival which was held on Saturday May 22nd.

The annual event which ran from 11am to 6pm along 10 blocks of Central Avenue hosted over 300 + Artisits, Crafters, Festival Food Vendors, and local businesses.

The Festival also had 4 stages of free music and entertainment, and kids attractions. Sponosred by the Central Avenue S.I.D Management Corp in partnership with Mayor Healy, and the City of Jersey City Municipal Council, Hudson County Executive Tom DeGise and the Board of Chosen Freeholders and paid for in part by the Jersey City Urban Enterprise Zone Program.

All Smiles After the Cantigas Women’s Choir Performance at St. Matthew Trinity Church in Hoboken

 

Cantigas Womenâ€s Choirâ€s assistant director Erasmia Voukelatos, Argentine guest conductor and composer of Magnificat Leonardo San Juan, and Cantigas director Joan Litman beam with pride after the Hoboken-based choir performed the North American premiere of San Juanâ€s piece on Saturday night at St. Matthew Trinity in Hoboken. Cantigas will perform the same program on Wednesday May 26th at 7:30 p.m. in Manhattan at the Church of St. Joseph at 371 Sixth Avenue in the West Village.      PHOTO CREDIT: Angelika Fuelleman/CantigasCanco

Canco Lofts in Jersey City Gets New Market  

Jersey City Mayor Jerrimiah Healy and Jersesy City Council President Peter Brennan  cut the ribbon for the Grand Opening of the new Zeytinia Market located in the beautful Jersey City’s Canco Lofts located on 50 Dey Street off St. Paul’s Avenue in Jersey City. Once the home of the American Can Company this property was developed to include 158 lofts and 44 spectacular duplex penthouses.         CANCO LOFTS

 

Bayonne High School junior exhibited Ceramic Piece at the Clay Studio Gallery in Philadelphia

 Junior Anthony Rodriguez a Ceramic 2 student of Ms. Terri Graham will had his ceramic piece  Slab Vessel displayed at a professional art gallery in Philadelphia PA. Anthony’s piece was entered in the Clay In Mind show at Burlington County Regional High School for jurying where it was selected to be exhibited at The Clay Studio Gallery.  This show presents the best of student ceramic art throughout the State of New Jersey.  Anthony’s Slab Vessel was selected for a 2^ND place award. The exhibit ran from Friday May 7^th and run until Saturday May 14^th. 

Anthony  Rodriguez plans on a career in Architecture.  His interest in geometric spaces and building design is evident in his winning art work.

The post May 2010 -EVENTS IN PHOTOS first appeared on River View Observer.