The Right Fit:
Volunteers Help Welfare-to-Work People Dress Right

Aired August 3, 1999 This is INFOhio After Nine, I am David C. Barnett, sending a hello your way on this 3rd day of August, 1999. President Clinton, as you just heard on NPR, is going to give a speech in Chicago today, citing figures that all 50 states are meeting their targets for moving people from welfare to work. Now critics chalk up such statistics to a surging U.S. economy, arguing that it's still very hard for people to get to work if they already don't have jobs. Here in Northeast Ohio, the struggle continues to help people make that transition, and this morning, as a part of our series, "The Changing Face of Welfare," we're going to hear about solving at least one piece of the puzzle, and it has to do with the way you look as you go into the job. When you normally would go into a job interview, you probably look in your closet for your best power suit, but not all people have that advantage. Trying to make it from welfare to work is tough enough without having to worry about clothing. 90.3's Lorna Jordan has more.

Lorna Jordan–Not far from Cleveland's Slavic Village on Broadway Ave. sits a large storefront, made of brick and glass. Happy Endings, New Beginnings looks like any other retail outlet from outside. Inside the store looks like a small warehouse, with racks of clothes neatly lining the floor. Every nook and cranny is filled with household items, toys, and books. The ten-year old organization helps people get the clothes they need to make the right impression. Happy Endings gives away items to the needy for free. People requiring clothing or household items need an appointment with a member of the staff.

Barbara Thompson–A lot of those people are people who are coming from the welfare to work, and now must have a certain look when they go for an interview, and maybe even need their clothing to go to work.

LJ–Barbara Thompson is the executive director of Happy Endings, New Beginnings.

BT–We also have clothing available for women who are out of shelters, domestic violence shelters or either drug abuse shelters, who are now turning their lives around, and they are in need of various items to get started over again. Those are the women that we help and we certainly have men who are in that same situation, who need help in order to get their children.

LJ–Happy Endings, New Beginnings is a non-profit organization and all the workers as well as Thompson are volunteers. She says having the right clothing and personal items helps break the cycle of poverty, and allows individuals to empower themselves. She recalls one welfare-to-work mom who came in to the store in need of an interviewing outfit.

BT–And you would not really believe just how exciting and how much more confidence a person can have when they're dressed properly for the job, and she came back to let us know that she did get the job, but she also let us know that she, in her mind, anyway, it was the outfit that did it. The moment that she walked in, that she just looked so great in this navy blue outfit, which I'm sure she did, but more important than that, I'm sure that what it did was give her the confidence to sit there and go through an interviewing, knowing that she looked great.

LJ–Thompson says that person was referred by Cleveland Works, another non-profit agency trying to help people move off the dole. Cleveland Works refers those in need to organizations providing similar services, such as Dress for Success, a nationwide chain of non-profit stores catering to individual communities. Dress for Success provides women with free suits so they can go out on an interview dressed well and cloaked in confidence.

BT–If you're not sitting there tugging at your skirt or trying to take the focus off of something that you have, and you have a stain on your blouse or you have your arm positioned a certain way, that maybe you're hoping will distract the interviewer, then if you don't have to worry about that, and you're not focusing on that, then you will appear a different person.

LJ–For INFOhio, this is Lorna Jordan in Cleveland.