Workforce Development Institute to use federal funding for wood, paper-products training

The Albany–based Workforce Development Institute (WDI) will deploy more than $571,000 in federal funding for workforce-training programs.

Specifically, WDI will use the money for creating and implementing workforce-training programs in the production of wood and paper products.

U.S. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D–N.Y.) and U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D–N.Y.) announced the funding in a Thursday news release.

The grant was allocated through the Northern Border Regional Commission (NBRC), a federal-state partnership that invests in economic and community-development projects throughout upstate New York, in addition to rural communities in other states in the Northeast, per the release.

The WDI, which is part of the AFL-CIO, supports rural economies in New York by “addressing worker skills needs, helping workers get local jobs, and expanding opportunities for employment in local communities,” the release stated. AFL-CIO is short for American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, a “federation of 55 national and international labor unions that represent 12.5 million working men and women,”

“The Workforce Development Institute is grateful and honored to be granted this award through the Northern Border Regional Commission. With a myriad of strong partners, we will work to strengthen this robust economic sector. We will do this by supporting the workforce from the forest to the factory floor all along the value chain,” Greg Hart, Workforce Development Institute’s regional director for the North Country, said.

Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com