workability

Mission: East Cascades Works supports the talent needs of employers and maximizes and aligns  investments in the career goals of individuals to fuel a thriving economy. 

Vision: We envision an East Cascades region with thriving communities, where residents have access to  education and training which leads to living wage jobs, and businesses find the qualified talent they  need to succeed. 

Values: We are all East Cascades Works Ambassadors. We embrace equity and inclusion. We are trusted  experts in workforce development and rigorous stewards of public funds. We are collaborative neutral  conveners. We inspire a call to action. We are results-driven. We are innovative problem solvers.  

East Cascades Region: The East Cascades workforce region includes ten counties in rural Oregon: Hood  River, Wasco, Sherman, Gilliam, Jefferson, Wheeler, Deschutes, Crook, Klamath and Lake. This region  has three very distinct labor sheds: Columbia Gorge, Central Oregon, and Klamath Basin; home to over  300,000 people and spanning 30,000 square miles.  

EC Works Organizational Description:  

East Cascades Works (EC Works) is a non-profit organization that focuses efforts and investments in the  talent needs of employers and in providing equitable access to workforce services and training programs  for youth and adults throughout three unique rural labor sheds: Columbia Gorge, Central Oregon, and  the Klamath Basin; and includes both Warm Springs and Klamath Tribal communities. 

EC Works is primarily funded by the US Department of Labor's Workforce Innovation and Opportunity  Act (WIOA) as such the core function of our organization is to oversee the public workforce system,  locally branded as WorkSource, throughout the 10-county region we serve. This work focuses on funding  career services and ensuring equitable access to secondary and post-secondary education completion,  work-readiness training, and career placement for youth and jobseekers in our community. As the  public’s workforce system, our providers work with job seekers who are unemployed or underemployed  and we prioritize services to veterans, emergent workforce, individuals who are deficient in math and  reading, those living in poverty, justice system involved, English language learners, and those  experiencing disabilities. We make additional investments, both monetarily and by staff commitment to  work alongside members of these populations to understand and assess key issues and areas of inequity  and access to education and career services. We advocate with and/or on behalf of our core partners;  Oregon Employment Department, Department of Human Services, Vocational Rehabilitation, Oregon  Commission for the Blind, Central Oregon Community College, Columbia Gorge Community College,  Central Oregon Intergovernmental Council, and Klamath Community College, at a state and local level to  implement programs and solutions that ultimately improves education and career outcomes. In doing  this, we’re simultaneously supporting the local economy, by expanding the labor pool to include often  untapped talent. 

Much like the priority populations that our board recognized, they have identified four high demand  industries that offer living wage occupations. Those sectors are Health Care, Technology, Construction  and Manufacturing. Our business support partners include the Oregon Employment Department, Youth  Career Connect, economic development organizations, chambers of commerce, industry associations, and business organizations that work in the four targeted sectors mentioned above.  

EC Works takes pride in developing innovative best practices, being good stewards of public funding  focusing on sustainability, strategic planning, budget management, fiscal and program compliance with  rigorous management of complex funding streams.