Governor John P. deJongh Jr. Monday congratulated the Office of Economic Opportunity and its director, Julito Francis, on the announcement that the Virgin Islands had been selected by the White House to serve on the National Jobs Task Force. Director Francis was informed of the territory’s selection to participate on the task force during his November 10th meeting in Washington, D.C., where he attended a Recovery Act Implementation Meeting, which brought together representatives from states and territories throughout the country.
Francis said on Monday that while the Governor’s administration continues to maximize every opportunity to provide jobs to Virgin Islanders through the funding made available by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the territory was selected for participation in the national task force to also help develop the process for counting jobs across America.
The National Jobs Task Force will make its recommendation to federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to help develop a more effective model to accurately count jobs across various agencies. A final job counts model will be developed jointly by the task force and representatives from OMB and other various federal agencies.
“The Virgin Islands was the only territory selected for participation in the Jobs Task Force, which will develop the model for other states and territories,” deJongh said, adding, that credibility of the stimulus program in large part relies on the jobs created from implementing the funds received. “Although the work continues here at home with respect to what we need to get done to get our territory back on track, I am very pleased to see that the work that OEO has done to date has been recognized in Washington and by our peers and I congratulate them on their efforts,” he said.