STRATEGIES & KEY INITIATIVES
Our Near Term Target: 40,000 more Detroiters Employed
Our Northstar Goal: 100,000 more Detroiters Employed
Detroit lags behind our peer cities in residential employment – without a coordinated and strategic focus on system change, it would take decades to reach our peer cities employment levels. To help us reach peer city residential employment rates, Detroit has set a target of helping create a system that increases residential employment by 40,000.
Detroiters face many barriers though when it comes to obtaining and sustaining employment.

Achieving our goals will require unprecedented focus and swift action through the following strategic areas of focus:

The Mayor’s Workforce Development Board is advancing a number of programs and initiatives across these three strategy areas. Each is strategically designed to provide support for a specific target population or growing industry in the City of Detroit.
Systems Change
Expanding the SNAP Employment & Training for those in Poverty
More than 200,000 Detroiters receive food assistance under the federal SNAP program. Under the SNAP E&T Program, the USDA provides a 50% match for the cost of skills & occupational training, adult foundational education, work experience or support services that will lead to new or better employment for SNAP participants.
Trainings & Career Pathways
Modernizing Career Technical Education in Detroit
A partnership between the City of Detroit and Detroit Public Schools, the Randolph Career and Technical Center provides industry standard training in high wage, high-need building and construction trades for youth and adults. Our partnership continues as we expand this work to Breithaupt Career and Technical Center.
Barrier Elimination
Expanding Returning Citizens & Expungement Initiatives
Our work centers on helping returning citizens and those with criminal records connect with training and and job opportunities. We work with partners to reduce systemic barriers, support in prison training, align community resources and develop job opportunities.
Advocating for policy changes to help Detroiters succeed
We worked on efforts to pass recent legislation that will eliminate all Driver Responsibility Fees in Michigan on October 1, 2018. This work will help lift this financial burden for almost 76,000 Detroiters and put them on a path to a driver’s license.