HARRISBURG, Pa. - Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf says he has a plan to create more jobs in the state while also helping to fight the spread of coronavirus. Which, As WLVR’s Tyler Pratt reports, hearkens back to a New Deal Era federal program from the Great Depression.
In 1933, President Franklin Roosevelent formed the Civilian Conservation Corps, a voluntary manual labor program for unemployed men aimed at conserving and developing natural resources on government lands. It ultimately employed millions of people in almost a decade and helped create state parks across the country.
Tom Wolf says his program — The Commonwealth Civilian Coronavirus Corps — will recruit and train new public health workers to help track spread of the virus and possibly help reduce the state’s unemployment rate, which he says is 1 in 6 Pennsylvanians.
“To reopen our economy to its maximum potential we will need to boost our ability to contain this highly transmissible virus…” said Governor Wolf.
Details are limited, and Wolf did not say how many people the program will employ or the cost, He did say he hopes to use funding from the federal government to pay for it.
