WASHINGTON – President Obama’s proposed 2014 federal budget includes an additional $100 million for the Department of Labor to spend on programs to better serve veterans and returning serving members seeking jobs.
With Castle Point and Montrose VA hospitals and their outpatient clinics in the Mid-Hudson Valley and nine job centers also located in the region, if approved, the additional funding would provide for more federal services for those job seekers, Acting Labor Secretary Seth Harris told MidHudsonNews.com on Tuesday.
“Many civilian employers don’t really fully understand what military training or military licenses or credentials mean in the civilian job market so we need help in figuring out how do we help civilian employers understand what experience a transitioning service member or veteran has that can be put to use in a civilian workplace,” Harris said.
If sequestration, which has impacted virtually all federal agencies, is not resolved in short order, Harris said this enhanced veterans’ job outreach effort would suffer and he put the blame of the furloughs on the Republicans in Congress