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A local organization has received a sizable amount of funding to help train workers for City of Orlando jobs in the green-collar industry.

The U.S. Department of Labor recently announced that it awarded $1.25 million to the Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation, which will be used to support job training for green-collar and related jobs.

Other groups throughout Florida also received grant money, including the Urban League of Broward County in Fort Lauderdale and the Florida Institute for Workforce Innovation Inc. in Melrose, both of which received $100,000.

According to an article by the Orlando Business Journal, the DOL handed out a total of $55 million in grant money to be used for green jobs throughout the country. The funding is part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which was passed earlier this year.

The funding came in the form of two grants. Green capacity building grants, totaling $5.8 million, are meant to increase the training capacity of 62 labor departments. Groups targeted through this grant include women, Native Americans, farm workers and at-risk youth.

State labor market information improvement grants, which will help connect job seekers with clean industry jobs after completing training, accounted for $48.8 million of the funding.

There has been a strong focus on green-collar jobs as of late in Orlando and throughout the country. A recent study from Orange County found that Central Florida could become a "cleantech hub" and grow its own economy by funding green grants and launching a new business incubator aimed at attracting green companies.

The Orlando area could certainly use the additional jobs, as the local economy has continued to see a decrease in employment amid a rising unemployment rate.

During September, the Orlando-Kissimmee area saw its unemployment rate increase from 11.1 percent to 11.5 percent, which was higher than the national unemployment rate at the time of 9.8 percent.

The area had a total non-farm employment of 1,015,700 workers during September, according to the U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is down from 1,017,700 workers during August and a 4.7 percent decrease from last year.

Labels: City of Orlando jobs