By Trevor McNally

On Friday December 6, Educate Maine held it’s annual education symposium in Portland. There it was projected that Maine will need 158,000 more trained workers over the next five years in order to maintain economic growth, according to the Portland Press Herald.

The construction industry has been hit especially hard, with CEO of the Associated General Contractors of Maine Matt Marks saying that “the industry lost about 10,000 workers – one third of its total workforce- during the great recession and has only recovered by about 5,000 workers since then.” And as I discussed in a previous article, there has been an unprecedented shortage of plumbers and HVAC technicians in Maine as well.

So, apart from recruiting more young people, how can Maine fill the job void being left by a retiring boomer generation? I think the most pragmatic answer is to entice and ingratiate more of Maine’s ever-growing immigrant population into the trades.

As of 2017 the percentage of foreign-born residents in Maine was 3.4 percent, or 45,433 people, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Portland made headlines in the New York Times earlier this year after 250 migrants from Africa arrived in the city in just one week, mostly from Angola and Congo. And every Maine resident is aware of the influx of Somali immigrants to Maine in the early 2000s. It should be noted, however, that African-born population make up the second least amount of foreign-born residents (6,925), behind residents from Latin America (5,243) and with residents from Asia making up the most (12,918).

Unfortunately, immigrants who are seeking asylum are not permitted to work until at least six months after they file their asylum applications. However, more can be done to make this growing population aware of the great resources available to them- like the apprenticeship program offered by UA Local 716 to become plumbers, pipefitters or HVAC technicians, for example- when they are eligible to work or to those who have already been living here for a while.

The Associated General Contractors of Maine will reportedly be offering a training program called “Construction 101” to new Mainers starting in January in Augusta. The program will include both classroom and on-the-job learning, as well as opportunities for participants to meet with potential employers, according to the Press Herald.

I believe that English language courses could and should be offered as part of all curriculum to bridge the language divide, whether they are apprenticeship or higher-education programs.

Regardless of where your views lie on the political spectrum regarding immigration, the fact the matter is that this shortage of workers threatens to do irreparable damage to Maine’s economy. It is a real developing crisis. And embracing the immigrant population’s potential to help lift Maine up from this crisis and providing them with opportunities for jobs, while also providing them with the resources to care for their families, is a win-win.