A federal program designed to turn “coal country” into “code country” by dedicating $2 million in federal funding to professional development training has delivered only 17 of the 200 jobs promised when it first launched in 2015.
The program, formulated as part of former President Barack Obama’s broader TechHire 2015 initiative, was designed as a public/private partnership in which underemployed and unemployed people in eastern Kentucky would receive software development internships designed to transition to full-time jobs upon completion of the program.
The initiative, which was supposed to receive a total of $ 4.5 million through 2019, was widely celebrated by media personalities and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, and even merited a laudatory segment on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show.”
The training program was discontinued less than a year after launch after Interapt, the private software company tasked with delivering on the program, provided only 17 of the 200 full-time jobs promised to taxpayers. A number of former program participants, interviewed on the Daily Signal’s “Underreported,” say they were inexplicably released after successfully completing the internship.
The program was administered at a local community college in Paintsville, a small town in eastern Kentucky that has born the economic brunt of the U.S. transition toward an information economy.
“The thing that got 800-plus people to apply and go through the process was that it promised jobs that would run from $30,000 to $40,000 a year,” former program participant Ben Larrabee told The Daily Signal.
Despite the organization’s failure to deliver in Kentucky, Interapt CEO Ankur Gopal is soliciting more federal funding to expand the program into states as far afield as Wyoming.
Jeff Whitehead, executive director for the Eastern Kentucky Concentrated Employment Program Inc., the public office charged with overseeing Interapt, unequivocally assessed the program as a failure.
“Interapt’s hiring results have not been what we expected, and that is unacceptable … However, the company has not lived up to its commitments, nor do we believe it has the ability to meet those expectations in the future. Therefore, we do not anticipate future contracts with the company,” Whitehead told the Daily Signal.
Paintsville Mayor Bill Runyon also said the program did not help the town in the slightest.
“Sometimes when you’re promised something, you may be being lied to,” Runyon told the Daily Signal.
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