South Side Church Helps Unemployed Find Work With Apprenticeship Program

CHICAGO (CBS) -- Chicago is seeing significant job growth, but the good fortune is not widespread.

According to the Metropolitan Planning Council, jobs grew 10% downtown, in the West Loop, and the near north side from 2010 through 2015; but the study says a majority of black neighborhoods saw a job loss of more than 11%.

One south side church is trying to change the statistics, pointing to one young man who has drastically changed his life, from a drug dealer and prison inmate to becoming a construction worker.

CBS 2's Jim Williams reports a $200 million construction project changing Lincoln Avenue near Fullerton is also transforming the life of Henry Lee.

"I've been here since the second week of April," Lee said. "It's changed my life tremendously. I'm receiving benefits, now pension, health care – all of that."

As a union apprentice, Lee is learning from veterans of the trades.

"They've got 30 years of experience to share with Henry and so what Henry is learning now is going to be valuable to him for the rest of his career," said Mark Bussey, Senior Superintendent with W.E. O'Neil.

Lee is starting his construction career less than a decade after he was in prison for selling drugs.

"I did a year and a half," Lee stated. After prison, Lee joined classes at the St. Paul Church of God in Christ on South Wabash.

"We challenged him to find the best man inside of himself," said Pastor Kevin Anthony Ford of St. Paul Church of God In Christ.

The classes at the church have linked young black men and women in neighborhoods with high unemployment to well-paying, union construction jobs for several years.

The classes aim to teach them what they need to know to pass exams for apprenticeships.

Pastor Kevin Anthony Ford said, "The opportunity is here, right now, today."

The opportunity is something that Lee, a 37-year-old father, says changed his life.

"My kids are happy. I'm setting a good example. My family loves it. I love it. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world," Lee said.

The church says nearly 200 men and women who have gone through the program have jobs in the trades now. In the current class, there are eight open spots.

To sign up, call Pastor Kevin A. Ford at 773-538-5120.

The deadline to sign up is Friday.