Elected Officials Tout Local Jobs Program, Healthcare
Larome Levy, an Austin neighborhood resident, is looking forward to college.
But first, he must pay $500 in fees he owes to Steinmetz High School.
The 18-year-old senior is now able to pay off the debt because of his new clerk job at Loretto Hospital, 645 S. Central Ave., Chicago.
“I like my job,” Levy said. “This has helped me with my fees… Now, I can get ready to learn business and law. I probably want to be a politician.”
Levy is one of several teens who local officials said is now able to work in a tight teen job market because of the new Community Coalition for Youth Summer Work Experience program.
Last week, Levy and other teens joined several elected officials at Loretto to promote a fund-raiser for the coalition, which helped provide about 100 jobs this summer.
The benefit allows youngsters to keep working and helps to expand the program to other teens.
The Phase Two Band will perform at 6 p.m. Aug. 19 at the Wire, 6815 Roosevelt Rd. in Berwyn, Ill. Tickets for the concert are $125 in advance and $135 at the door.
“The benefit concert demonstrates that we care,” said Ill. State Rep. Camille Lilly, (Dist.-78th), vice president of external affairs and development at Loretto Hospital.
The program also is attempting to raise money through gofundme site.
The coalition is a Loretto Youth Council on Healthcare Initiative.
The youth council was created by the Loretto Hospital Foundation to help educate and involve Austin area youth about health issues.
Lilly said the jobs program is needed because state budget cuts have eliminated many summer jobs for African American youth.
Hundreds of jobs in Chicago were cut this summer for teens by the state, Democrats said.
Aside from Lilly, other lawmakers included U.S. Rep Danny Davis (Dist. – 7th), State Sen. Kimberly Lightford (Dist. 4), La Shawn Ford (Dist. 8), and Ald. Emma Mitts (37th Ward).
Cook County Commissioner Richard Boykin also was part of the meeting on the health care insurance programs.
The group also participated in another news conference on the importance of the Medicaid and Medicare programs, pointing out that the healthcare safety net programs were celebrating their 50th year anniversaries.
“We come to commemorate and celebrate but we also come to say to all public officials keep your hands off of Medicaid,” Davis said. “You can lose other things but when you talk about cutting Medicare, Medicaid, you are going into dangerous territory.”
Loretto Hospital has many patients who use Medicaid, hospital officials said.
In fact, most of the hospital’s revenues come from Medicaid, they acknowledged.
State officials were unable to say how the current Illinois budget proposal would impact Medicaid.
Gov. Bruce Rauner proposed a budget with a $1.5 billion cut to Medicaid, which would have met a $3.6 million cut for Loretto. On Friday, however, the State Department of Healthcare and Family Services decided that Illinois will fully fund Medicaid – with or without a state budget, officials said.
For more information about the fund-raiser, call 773-610-8059.
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