Disabled on Long Island face joblessness

If it seems the unemployment rate on Long Island is high -- it was 6.8 percent in September, not counting "discouraged workers" who have stopped looking for jobs -- joblessness among the disabled is eye-popping: 90 percent of the 3,000 people represented by a single disabled organization are out of work.

That's according to Robert Budd, chief executive of Bethpage-based Family Residences and Essential Enterprises Inc., a nonprofit that provides services to children and adults with developmental disabilities. FREE is one of the largest such agencies on the Island for developmental disabilities. The anemic economic recovery has made unemployment for the disabled worse, said Christopher Long, FREE's chief operating officer.

FREE is taking a novel step: It is partnering with the Nassau and Suffolk labor departments to hold a Talent Connection Job Expo at its Old Bethpage headquarters Oct. 27. Budd said the event is the first in which FREE and the two labor departments have joined to host a job fair. About 100 public and private agencies and 500 businesses have been invited to participate.

"We're getting responses now," Budd said. "I can't tell you how many businesses will actually be there, but we've gotten a lot of responses."

Winthrop-University Hospital in Mineola will take part, said Diane Bachor, the hospital's director of grants and special programs. "We're going to be looking for two or three people," Bachor said, adding the hospital has hired interns from FREE in the past to work as file clerks or in the accounting office.

"A lot of people think our people are only capable of entry-level jobs," Budd said. But, he said, in the past FREE has found jobs for its population at law firms, technology companies, garden centers and at distributors. "Often, when someone looks different, people don't want to give them a chance," Budd said.