OLD TOWN – With the job market and economy on a downward spiral, the Old Town transitional team is hoping to turn things around for local residents by holding a job fair on Wednesday, Sept. 10, said Gary Baldwin, chair of the team.

“We’re really hopping and ready to go for the September job fair,” said Baldwin, who also serves as director of the Old Town-Orono YMCA where the event will be held. “The job fair runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and will include a number of resources for the unemployed.”

The Bangor CareerCenter and Maine Employment Resource, which falls under the Maine Department of Labor, is handling most of the details.

The transitional team, which formed after Georgia-Pacific Paper Co. laid off more than 150 mill workers in April, is a gathering of area organizations, residents, educators, church members, city administrators and businesses.

“We’ve mailed out over 200 invitations to businesses throughout the state of Maine and some outside the state of Maine,” said Paul Ruggiero, employment and training specialist for the CareerCenter. “A lot of the dislocated workers are from the mill so we tried to target industries and companies those workers have skills for.”

So far 17 companies have signed up to participate in the job fair.

“These companies have job openings,” said Baldwin.

Next week CareerCenter employees will be calling the companies by phone to see if any overlooked their invitations in an effort to boost participation. The CareerCenter holds a job fair every three months at its Bangor location. This year, because of the mill closing and the number of unemployed residents in the Old Town area, the job fair moved to the Old Town-Orono YMCA. The last job fair the CareerCenter held had 24 employers in attendance and around 200 participants. Ruggiero said he hopes the numbers are higher than normal at the September event.

There are several partners working on making the job fair a success, said Ruggiero, including the Training and Development Corp. and residents and groups from several surrounding communities. Baldwin said the United Way and Crossroad Ministries are other partners.

“There is going to be one-on-one for people who need to talk about health care needs and people here to help with writing resumes,” said Baldwin. “There are going to be agencies up here that are trying to help.”

In other transitional team news, the backpack campaign the team recently undertook to supply needy area students with back-to-school essentials is still 20 backpacks short.

“We’re really close to meeting our goal,” Baldwin said Wednesday. “We have moved all the backpacks to the elementary schools. We should have about 80 of the other 100 to the middle schools today [Wednesday] so we’re only about 20 short, or about $300 short. We’re hoping to have them by the end of Labor Day weekend.”

Anyone who would like information on the job fair or the backpack campaign can call Baldwin at 827-6111.