A Special Report: Jobs : One Couple--1,000 Youth Jobs

In the year since Reginald and Renea Morris started the Youth Jobs Awareness Project, nearly 1,000 teen-agers and young adults have found temporary and permanent jobs throughout Los Angeles County.

This summer, the program will help place an additional 104 young people in jobs at eight projects, including an adopt-a-block beautification program, a journalism internship at the jobs organization and a tree-planting project in the city.

“This was one year of a lot of corporate business partnerships to make sure youth in Los Angeles have jobs,” Reginald Morris told a group of supporters and corporate sponsors at a recent news conference.

This year’s summer job placements include a 16-week secretarial, maintenance and security training program; two neighborhood beautification programs; a customer service cosmetic internship; and a summer-long internship under President Clinton’s Summer of Service project.

The project was started a week after last year’s riots, which the Morrises said sparked their desire to do something significant for young people in the community. They started a jobs telephone hot line in the living room of their South-Central home.

After six months, the organization moved to a small office in Inglewood. A few months later, with donations from Disney and the Drew Economic Development Corp., the job program moved its operations to a larger space at 126th Street and Willowbrook Avenue.

Although the jobs program has filled all of its summer job openings, it places applicants ages 14 to 25 in positions with agencies and businesses year-round. Information: (213) 750-JOBS.