Katrina leaves up to 750,000 at least temporarily jobless

"It's heartbreaking and unimaginable," Labor Secretary Elaine
Chao said in an interview.

Chao said that this weekend she approved $20.7 million to hire 10,000
dislocated workers to aid recovery and clean-up efforts in Louisiana in
the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The secretary said she's prepared to
authorize another $41.4 million, when the rescue situation stabilizes
enough to get more people to work.

Her agency has also assigned 100 workers to canvass shelters and
other locations with laptop computers that can instantly sign up residents
who lost jobs to quickly qualify for unemployment insurance -- that can
provide as much as half their regular salary.

"We have a lot of people who don't have a job and don't have any
money," Chao said. "We want to help by first making sure they know and qualify for unemployment insurance and also by making sure that they get many of the cleanup and constructions jobs so they not only get back to work but participate in the clean-up and recovery of their own communities."

Bernard Weinstein, director of the Texas-based Center for Economic
Development and Research, said the housing boom in many states has
created an abundance of constructions jobs, and that demand will grow
significantly because of all the reconstruction required by Hurricane Katrina. But he said it isn't "always easy" to get workers in the service industry, who make
up a good portion of metro New Orleans workforce, to adapt to even
entry-level construction jobs.

Many displaced hurricane victims are now living in communities far
from their homes. A good many metro New Orleans residents are now living in
Baton Rouge and thousands more are now in Texas, many now living in the
Houston Astrodome or Reunion Arena in Dallas, according to Weinstein.

"Our hospitality industry in Texas is doing okay; it's not doing
great," Weinstein said. "But we already have a large supply of low-skilled
workers, many Mexican Americans who fill most of those jobs now. So refuges from New Orleans will be competing with them for the low-skill jobs."'

Bruce Katz, an economist with the Brookings Institution, said that
the Labor Department is right to focus "initially" on helping workers to
prepare for the jobs in construction that are likely to make up a large portion
of the Metro New Orleans economy for the next year.

But he said "long term" the federal government ought to help poor
New Orleans residents get closer to where job opportunities are by giving
them housing vouchers that they can use to relocate to "other sections of
the city with more opportunities, the suburbs or even other states."

"After the Los Angeles earthquakes the Clinton administration gave
out housing vouchers to displaced residents and it gave people a chance to
move closer to where there were more employment opportunities, and closer to
where their kids could get a good education," Katz said.

Catherine Shamsie, manager of the Baton Rouge office for employment
agency Kelly Services Inc. said that there are so many hurricane
escapes from Metro New Orleans in her city that her officer is seeing triple or
quadruple the usual number of job seekers.

``Most of our people here are homeless, jobless and with
very minimal clothing on their back,'' Shamsie said. ``We try to do what we
can and work with them to accommodate lack of identification.''

Some employers are continuing to pay their New Orleans workers,
helping arrange housing and food, and coordinating charitable funds for other
staff to donate cash.

Boyd Gaming Corp. will continue to pay employees of its
Treasure Chest Casino in Kenner, La., for at least eight weeks, chairman William S. Boyd said in a statement.

``We are deeply concerned for the health and safety of our
employees, and they remain our highest priority at this point,'' Boyd
said.

Housing Secretary Alphonso Jackson said he's very concerned about
so many New Orleans residents being out of work, and will strive to find a
way to employ local residents in the work required to rebuild and restore
public housing units damaged or destroyed by the Hurricane.