Job Fair Draws 1,200 In South Sacramento

Hundreds of people who live in South Sacramento applied to fill more than 2,000 job and training-program openings Thursday. 

Jobs in green energy, law enforcement, retail, trucking, and construction were just some of the open positions at a job fair at the Pannell Center on Meadowview Road.

Jazmine Doughty is 24 and a recent graduate of Sacramento City College. She hopes to use her schooling to get an entry-level position while she tries for a bachelor's degree.

'Hopefully, I can get some callbacks because I haven't got any in awhile. And, so, maybe just get my foot in the door and if they call me back and offer a position, I'd be really grateful for that," Doughty says.
 
Martin Mack is 77.  He says he's looking for a little extra spending money.

"I have some things on my bucket list I want to do and the only way to do it is financing it through having a job," Mack says.

District 8 City Councilman Larry Carr hosted the event. He says the people at community meetings in his district have made their priorities clear.

"The number one priority -by far, everything else paled in comparison- was jobs," Carr says.

About a dozen school districts, law enforcement agencies  and job-training services also recruited for vacant positions  in upcoming academies.

Government, law enforcement, and mass transit jobs were posted, as were positions for baristas, utility workers and hospital staff.

The Elk Grove School District was one of a dozen agencies or trade associations with information on training programs.

Therese Schultz with the school district says there are an increasing number of programs and positions in the healthcare industry.

"There's an aging population going on and with most of our trainings being in the medical field, there is a growth for people that are needed in that area. We do a billing and coding specialist. We do a medical assistant."

Carr says this is the first in a series of job fairs in his district.