ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Hundreds of families across Tampa Bay and Central Florida are facing an uncertain future after the United States Department of Labor announced it's suspending Job Corps.
Job Corps is a federal program that helps disadvantaged young people across the country develop key life skills and get the job training necessary to fill vital vocational jobs.
Watch full report from Chad Mills
The decision was announced in a Thursday press release. According to the release, the pause at all contractor-operated Job Corps centers will occur by June 30, 2025.
One of Florida’s three Job Corps centers is located in St. Petersburg and serves 260 current students.
Three of them are Laila Al-Mansour, from Daytona; Isaac Hertz, from Lakeland; and Serenity Wilson, from Ruskin.
All three say Job Corps gave their lives direction and purpose, but now, the three are facing uncertain futures. Hundreds of others across the country are facing similar fates.
“These people have nowhere to go. They have no people to call or to talk to. They have to go back to places like living on the street and stuff,” said Al-Mansour Woodard.
“Children are going to be homeless. That’s insane,” added Wilson.
Like Wilson and Al-Mansour Woodard, Hertz has also seen a transformation in his life.
“I used to just sit in my room and be completely alone for days on end,” he said.
At Job Corps, he was pursuing a certificate in facility management. Al-Mansour Woodard was studying IT. Wilson was pursuing training in nursing.
Like many others, they learned of the program’s pause on Thursday.
“It was out of nowhere,” Wilson recalled. “Immediately, tears were falling. The fear on people’s faces — it was bad. It hurt me. I cried so hard, because I’m like, ‘What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do?’”
In recent Congressional testimony, U.S. Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-Deremer pointed to what she described as the program’s “serious flaws,” which include a $1.7 billion annual price tag and a 39% graduation rate.
“I understand the president’s budget is signaling that this is not something that’s sustainable over time,” the secretary said.
A source knowledgeable of the St. Pete center, who spoke to ABC Action News anonymously out of fear of retaliation, said a recent transparency report used to scrutinize the program’s cost and effectiveness is misleading according to the National Job Corps Association. The source also pointed to recent numbers that demonstrate successes at the center in St. Pete.
According to that data, 48 high school diplomas were earned by the center’s students in 2024. In the same time frame, the center saw 94 trade graduates, 151 primary industry certifications, and 157 secondary industry certifications.
The federal transparency report shows the St. Pete center also saw a 55% graduation rate, which is higher than the national average.
To Hertz, tax dollars spent on Job Corps is money well spent.
“It’s worth it,” he said. “These people don’t have places to go. These are also kids. There are so many minors here.”
He hopes the Trump Administration will reverse course. His mother, who voted for President Trump, hopes so too.
“If you’re going to actually do it, which I don’t think you should. I think you should do something different and give it over years time of transition, not just abrupt with no notice,” Ronda Hertz, of Lakeland, said.
For now, though, her son and thousands of others are facing uncertain futures. The St. Pete center is expected to begin unenrolling its students next week.
ABC Action News is told at least 8% of the center’s current students are considered homeless or unhoused.
