JobLinks Wins Gold Connecticut Quality Improvement Award JobLinks has been recognized among the state’s innovative businesses, receiving a Gold Innovation Award from the Connecticut Quality Improvement Award (CQIA) Partnership for the creation and success of accessible, affordable transportation options for low-income workers in Northwest Connecticut. Adding to the honor is the fact that JobLinks is the only Waterbury company to receive this award. The JobLinks Policy Committee designed a flexible, targeted and responsive transportation system to expand employment options for low-income people entering the workforce in the Northwest Region of Connecticut. It accomplished this by making efficient use of resources by complementing existing routes and adding new routes only when demand for transportation had been established. The Policy Committee includes state departments ( Dept. of Labor, Dept. of Social Services and Dept. of Transportation); transportation providers (Northeast Transportation, HART, Northwest Transit District and Managed Transportation Services); and regional ridesharing brokerages (Rideworks, Metropool and The Rideshare Company). “It is an honor to facilitate a program that epitomizes a true partnership between State Departments, ridesharing brokerages and non-profit agencies. Each member of the JobLinks Policy Committee can take pride and ownership in this award for creating a program that has helped so many people,” said Carol Belforti, JobLinks Coordinator from Rideworks. (Rideworks is also responsible for marketing the job access program.) Before JobLinks, low-income people in the Northwest region who did not have cars or driver’s licenses had great difficulty traveling to sustainable jobs. Existing transportation services either did not reach the areas where many of the jobs were located or did not run during the hours when the workers needed the transportation, such as evenings and weekends. Transportation costs for first-time workers were difficult to meet prior to receiving their first paycheck. Employers located beyond the bus routes in Waterbury, Torrington and Danbury were unable to hire the number of entry-level workers they needed. “Connecticut’s growth depends on innovative organizations. Out of the nearly 243,000 businesses in Connecticut, winners of the CQIA Innovation prize represent the creativity, ingenuity and drive that will lead Connecticut’s economic growth,” says Sheila Carmine, Executive Director of The CQIA Partnership, Inc. JobLinks currently offers 23 different projects in the Northwest Region. At least 1,000 new jobs have been accessed due to JobLinks services. Nearly 500 employers whose locations were not on bus routes now have access to new pools of workers: 38 in Southbury, 6 in Canaan (three shifts), 100 in Ridgefield, 44 in Naugatuck and the remainder along the Beacon Falls/Ansonia Route 8 corridor. Funding for the JobLinks program comes from the Connecticut Department of Social Services through the Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board and the Federal Transit Administration through the Connecticut Department of Transportation.