Corrections or additions?
These articles were prepared for the October 4, 2000 edition of
U.S. 1 Newspaper. All rights reserved.
Bus to 8A Helps in Hiring
How to hire and keep entry level shift workers: Provide
transportation. Soon employers at Exit 8A will get government
assistance
for this purpose. The Mercer County Workforce Investment Board and
Greater Mercer TMA have set up a bus service, called Wheels to Work,
to provide transportation to jobs along Route 130 and Exit 8A.
Wheels to Work will run during commuting hours and will even
accommodate
those on late shifts. It starts at the Hamilton train station and
will operate from 5:30 to 10:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. to midnight.
“The county had an extensive planning process to determine that
low-income county residents couldn’t get to the entry level jobs at
Exit 8A,” says Sandra Brillhart of Greater Mercer
Transportation
Management Association.
Among those employers holding their breaths, waiting for the bus,
are Wakefern, BASF, Coca Cola, Barnes & Noble, and various staffing
agencies. “The interest was overwhelming,” says Cathy
Tramontana,
executive director, Mercer Workforce Investment Board.
“The grant is aimed at getting transit mobility to that side of
the county, and also at helping individuals from WorkFirst New Jersey
get to their jobs,” says Tramontana. The one-year “Jobs Access
and Reverse Commute Grant” of $300,000 was provided through
Federal
Transportation Administration through NJTransit. Some of the funds
came from a welfare to work fund.
“Because it is a combination grant,” says Tramontana, “our
buses are available to anyone who wants to ride, not just
welfare-to-work
recipients.” Those on a WorkFirst New Jersey program will use
a special bus pass, but everyone else will pay $1 per trip.
Two 26-passenger buses are supposed to start routes early in October.
The bus can also be used for healthcare and shopping visits; it leaves
from the Hamilton Rail Station and stops at Five Points, the Ames
Center, Horizon Center, East Windsor Town Center, RWJ Hospital at
Hamilton, and the industrial parks at Exit 8A. Geared to serve shift
workers, the last bus will leave South Brunswick at around 11 p.m.
and get back to the Hamilton train station around midnight.
Bristol-Myers Squibb and Janssen Pharmaceutica gave importantsupport to September’s Mercer County American Heart Walk which raisednearly $240,000 for the American Heart Association. The chapter willsponsor the first-ever mass CPR training event on Saturday, April28, at the College of New Jersey (www.americanheart.org) or call800-AHA-USA1.Share Our Strength , the national anti-hunger and anti-povertyorganization, distributed more than $30,000 in grants last month toPrinceton area anti-hunger and anti-poverty agencies(www.strength.org).This money was raised through Share Our Strength’s Taste of theNation,the nation’s largest culinary benefit to fight hunger. One hundredpercent of all ticket proceeds from the event support local, state,national, and international organizations. This year, Share OurStrength’sTaste of the Nation, presented nationally by American Expressand Williams-Sonoma Inc., raised more than $4.7 million.The Princeton event raised more than $52,000 to fight hunger andpoverty.Grant recipients were Homefront (www.homefrontnj.org), whichworks for homeless families to return them to an independent life;Isles, an organization that addresses critical housing, environmental,community, and youth issues; Mercer Street Friends, an agency thatprovides for the basic needs of the poor; and Trenton Area SoupKitchen,which provides meals, programs, and advocacy services.Wild Oats Community Market donated $799.40 (five percentof its sales for one day last month) to HiTops, the Princeton-basednon-profit organization offering educational programs to area teensabout their sexuality and reproductive health. The day was part ofa company-wide giving program. HiTops provides quality educationalprograms on HIV/AIDS, date rape drugs, responsible decision-makingfor prevention of teen pregnancy, and more.PNC Bank gave $10,000 to Komen New Jersey’s Race for theCure, which will be held on Sunday, October 29, at Bristol MyersSquibbon Route 206 in Lawrenceville. PNC Bank will also sponsor awater station at the one-mile mark of the man’s and women’s 5K racesand Health Walk, and provide 50 employee volunteers to assist withrace activities.United Way of Greater Mercer County was given $200,000from the Williams Company, an energy and high-technology companybased in Texas. The company will have contributed another $6 millionby the end of the employees’ 2,000-mile bike ride, which began lastweek in West Windsor, and will end at the Williams’ headquarters inHouston. United Way of Greater Mercer County is a community-basedorganization which mobilizes community resources to meet local healthand human care needs.Top Of PageJ&J GrantsJohnson & Johnson of New Brunswick will receive a CommitmentAward on Thursday, October 5, from the Business Committee for theArts, Inc. and Forbes Magazine at the Art Institute of Chicago.Johnson& Johnson supports “The Artist As Catalyst” program, whichplaces artists in communities around the state to work with residentsto create large-scale public works of art. The company contributedto the construction and opening festivities of the New JerseyPerformingArts Center (NJPAC) and underwrites performances by the New JerseySymphony Orchestra. It also studies, promotes, exhibits, and preservesthe art produced by mentally disabled artist. It manages an artcollectionof more than 3,000 works, publishes a quarterly newsletter informingemployees of upcoming exhibitions and special arts programs, andproducesa guide to area museums and cultural institutions.Johnson & Johnson has given Rutgers University $550,000to fund a new undergraduate research fellowship, eight ongoing orexpanded project fellowships, a previously established research awardsprogram, and help underwrite the cost of six new projects. Some ofthe projects being funded include the university’s Center for Childrenand Childhood Services, the Rutgers Women in Neuroscience program,the Discovery Research Awards project, the university’s pre-doctoralfellowships in neuroimmunology, pharmaceutics, biotechnology, andneuroscience, and a series of speakers at Rutgers on health andmedicaltopics.Top Of PageWomen’s Issues: MBAs and JobsThe main reasons why women fail to pursue an MBA arethe lack of role models and lack of encouragement from employers,according to a study released by Catalyst and The University ofMichiganBusiness School and its Center for the Education of Women. The study,to assess attitudes toward a business education and the MBA degree,was based on surveys of groups of high-performing women undergraduatesand women in other graduate programs,Around 80 percent of both men and women MBAs see themselves as havingjob assignments that provide visibility with senior management, thesurvey said. Men and women MBAs who have continually worked sincegaining their MBA have virtually identical promotion rates, thoughonly 29 percent of women have worked continuously since gaining theirdegrees. To make business a more desirable goal for women, companiesmust work to enhance career outcomes for women MBAs, the report said.Previous StoryNext StoryCorrections or additions?This page is published by PrincetonInfo.com— the web site for U.S. 1 Newspaper in Princeton, New Jersey.
