BETWEEN JOBS

At the risk of sounding ungrateful for the federal assistance going toward the economically straitened Katahdin region and elsewhere across Maine: Could the feds hurry things along?

The National Emergency Grants from the Department of Labor have been hugely appreciated. Maine in the last year has received about one-third of all of the grants going to the New England region – $24 million in valuable assistance to fishermen, paper workers, shoe workers and many others who have lost their jobs. But the determination time on these grants is supposed to be 30 days, according to Rep. Mike Michaud, who has understandably been on the phone to Labor a lot lately because the grants process is taking three to six months.

The grants are not charity. They are compensation under the Trade Adjustment Reform Act of 2002 and the Trade Adjustment Assistance Act created to offset the downside of expanding international trade. There has been for Maine, it needs hardly be said, plenty of downside to free trade in addition to the positive news. Last spring, for instance, the Department of Labor found that 2,800 Maine workers qualified under these programs for subsidized health insurance. Other payments have gone for worker retraining, job searches and counseling. Nationally, the department spent $220 million in the TAA program last fiscal year and made $39 million available for job search and relocation allowances.

Rep. Michaud says he is working with the department to shorten the time between when a grant is submitted and when a conclusion is made about it. And Maine’s entire delegation deserves credit for helping the state receive the grants for which it qualifies. But being the recipient of such a disproportionate share of the money reinforces the fact that Maine, much more than other states, is hurting economically, especially in manufacturing sectors that were once so important to building the state’s middle class.

Maine has six pending grant applications worth another $7.6 million, but the funding is merely temporary. While the congressional delegation works on speeding up the time taken to process the grants, the state must be even bolder in taking action to build a stronger economy so that there is less need for the job-relocation funds in the future.