
DATE: Tuesday, July 15, 1997                TAG: 9707150097

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LEWIS KRAUSKOPF, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE                        LENGTH:   63 lines

FAST OPENS A NEW TOOLBOX TO HELP FOLKS GAIN SELF-SUFFICIENCY

For the 30 public housing residents, Darveen Mullen was proof.

About nine months ago, Mullen - a public housing resident - had completed a computer training program that helped her land a data-entry job.

Monday night, Mullen stood in front of the packed community center of the Peaceful Village housing complex and spoke about gaining self-sufficiency.

``It's not where you live, it's who you are,'' said Mullen, a resident of MacDonald Manor and a full-time employee of the Chesapeake Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

Her fiery speech, punctuated by loud applause, culminated a pitch from the authority about how residents can move away from government assistance.

Monday's morning, afternoon and evening meetings were the first of the authority's Families Achieving Self-Sufficiency Together program. FAST officials - who will visit the city's other four public housing complexes during the next few weeks - will be working in the Peaceful Village center to help residents move past barriers for succeeding in the job market.

On Monday, Peaceful Village residents filled out questionnaires assessing those barriers.

For Michele Wilkins and Lionell Billups, both unemployed parents, that meant job training. For others, that could have meant solving child care or transportation problems, or dealing with substance abuse or domestic violence.

Regardless of the problem, authority officials urged residents to act as the state prepares to drop its hammer on welfare in Hampton Roads.

As of April, 1,699 Chesapeake families were receiving welfare assistance. That was down from 2,133 in July 1995. Under the state-mandated Virginia Initiative for Employment not Welfare, 924 able-bodied welfare recipients in Chesapeake will be required to work for their benefits beginning Oct. 1.

``Welfare reform is no joke,'' Margaret Freeman, the authority's director of resident services, told the residents. ``This is here for the long haul.''

In response, the authority presented its five-year program to help residents succeed. For example, at the Peaceful Village center, FAST will have a job placement center in which officials will offer practice with interviews and help writing resumes and scouring want ads.

Similar centers have sprouted in Suffolk and Norfolk, where housing authorities are helping residents become self-supportive.

Antoinette Wilson, one resident, doesn't receive welfare; the 31-year-old mother already supports herself with two jobs. But she wants to see her two children more, and Monday's meeting left her excited about opening the doors to more training to help her attain a better-paying job.

Wilson said she hopes ``this is going to put me on my feet,'' but ``I don't want any (job) that's going to bore me.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo

MORT FRYMAN/The Virginian-Pilot

Jackie Spratley, standing, prepares information about Families

Achieving Self-Sufficiency Together for Wilhelminia Dukes of

Chesapeake. The program aims to help people move past barriers and

succeed in the job market.

Graphic

DETAILS

For details about the FAST program, call the authority's resident

services office:

543-1631. KEYWORDS: WELFARE REFORM JOB TRAINING