All-abilities job fair coming to Old Bethpage

Jobseekers of all abilities will be welcomed at a special job fair in Old Bethpage on Wednesday.

The event, hosted by nonprofits Family Residences and Essential Enterprises (FREE) and Life’s WORC, is aimed at giving Long Islanders with disabilities — and those without  — the opportunity to meet with local employers looking to hire.

The fair, which runs from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at FREE’s Old Bethpage offices, 191 Bethpage Sweet-Hollow Rd., is expected to attract upwards of 200 attendees and nearly 20 employers, including PaveMaster, His & Hers Cleaning Solutions, Chick-fil-A and Walgreens. 

The event gives those often excluded from the labor force the chance to make their case to employers, said fair coordinator Anita Dowd-Neufeld, senior vice president of community services for FREE, which provides housing, employment and family services to Long Islanders with intellectual, physical, and developmental disabilities. “There are many open positions on Long Island, particularly in entry level jobs, and our people are willing and able to fill those jobs,” she said.

Dowd-Neufeld said hiring opportunities have improved for those with disabilities since she started the fair over a decade ago, though  employment data continues to paint a grim picture.

The unemployment rate for people with disabilities was 18.6% in Nassau County and 13.3% in Suffolk, according to 2021 Census Bureau data. In comparison, the jobless rate for the overall population was 6.6% in Nassau and 5.7% in Suffolk, according to the 2021 data.

But those figures only account for disabled Islanders who are employed or looking for work.

The labor force participation rate — the percentage of working-age individuals in the labor market — was much lower for people with disabilities than for the general population.  In Nassau, it was 48.8% for disabled workers compared with 66% for the total population. Suffolk residents with a disability had a participation rate of 43.9% versus a 62.5% rate overall. 

'I'm still looking'

Jobseeker Thomas Esposito, 30, said looking for a job has been more difficult as an Islander with a disability.

“I think it’s a hard process because I have a disability,” said Esposito, a Bay Park resident utilizing job coach services from Life’s WORC, which provides behavior analysis, housing and employment services to developmentally disabled adults and children. “I’m still looking.”

Esposito, who wants to find a position in maintenance, said he’s hopeful about the upcoming hiring event.

“I’m getting excited about that, about getting another job as soon as possible,” he said. “Everyone thinks I’m a good team player.”

Advocates say numerous factors make navigating the job market harder for those with disabilities. Employer bias, limited availability of assistance programs, transportation issues, and fear of losing vital benefits can all play a part in making the job market harder to enter.

Acute labor shortage

But with the Island and the nation experiencing an acute  labor shortage, advocates said now is a good time for employers to reevaluate their hiring practices.

“It’s a perfect opportunity to link a talent pipeline that is remarkably underleveraged with employers who are really starving for highly motivated and talented members of the workforce,” said Chris Rosa, president and chief executive of the Viscardi Center, an Albertson-based nonprofit network serving disabled Long Islanders.

Rosa shared his comments after speaking at a discussion on the importance and strategic advantages of hiring those with disabilities held last week by the Long Island Association business group.

He said individuals with disabilities have higher retention rates and lower rates of absenteeism than the general employee base, which is good for businesses in this tight labor market. But the reasons for that speak to the effects of decades of exclusion from the labor force, he said.

“As much as I’d like to think so, it’s not because we’re any more noble,” said Rosa, who has limb-girdle muscular dystrophy and has used a wheelchair since age 12. “It’s because we’ve been excluded for so long that when we finally seize the opportunity, we cling to it with a sense of pride and a sense of urgency.”

Henry Fielder of Hempstead, a building maintenance mechanic, said before finding a job, a year of unsuccessful job hunting started to take a toll on his mental health. “I ... got a little depressed,” he said.

Fielder, 56, is one of the more than 250,000 people living on Long Island who has a disability, according to Census estimates.

Eventually Fielder turned to the TRI Business & Career Training Center, a nonprofit overseen by  FREE. There he received training that landed him a job at TRI, which later turned into a building maintenance job at FREE.

Fielder said it was hard to tell whether his disability played a part in his job search struggles or not. “I know once I got in touch with the TRI program and FREE, things started to turn around tremendously,” he said. “They have worked wonders for me.” 

For information about the jobs expo, call (516) 870-1621 or visit FamilyRes.org/events.