Estimated 500 local jobs available at job fair
Event set for this Saturday at Chamber
Lisa Hobbs

If you’re in need of a job, visit the McMinnville-Warren County Chamber of Commerce this Saturday, Nov. 2, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Employers will be waiting.
The Industrial Development Board is holding a job fair with the goal of helping local industries fill approximately 500 jobs.
“I think this is going to be productive for everybody in the community, for industries and for folks looking for a job,” said Industrial Development Board director George Burke.
Representatives from about 10 industries will be on hand as they are all in the hiring process, including Bridgestone, Yorozu, Morrison Tool & Fab, Miniature Precision Components, Jarden, Simpkins Energy, and TennSmith.
“We have a couple more we are working with,” said Burke. “Those are not definite, but we have confirmations from around 10.”
SMX Staffing out of Murfreesboro will be on hand with a need to fill 5,500 warehouse jobs. However, the positions are mostly temporary and will end in January, although SMX says there is a chance for some employees to be retained.
Burke says job fairs such as this help dispel at least two misconceptions in the community. First, he says people wrongly believe there are no jobs available locally. And second, the job fair can show potential employers there’s a capable and ready workforce here.
“The last job fair I was involved in was in the 1988 or so,” he said. “It was when AquaTech was trying to make up their mind if they wanted to relocate here. They said there wasn’t enough employees here to fill their need in this community. We had a job fair and they got three to four applicants for every job available. It convinced them they were wrong.”
Traveling from industry to industry is difficult to do for people in need of a job. Burke says providing them a centralized location where they can apply for 10 or more jobs at once is helpful.
“This community has around a 10 percent unemployment rate,” he said. “There are people out there who need a job. Let’s bring these industries together in one location so these people don’t have to hop from location to location hoping to catch them during a hiring process.”
The most recent figures from the state show Warren County has a 9.2 percent unemployment rate, down from 10.3 percent the month before.
IDB received approval from city officials to close off a section of Court Square and use The Lot during the event for setting up tables, tents and food vendors.
“Our No. 1 obligation, as a community, is to our companies to make sure they have enough workers,” said Burke, in making the request. “If a company is making an investment in another community based on the fact they can’t find people to work here in Warren County and we are out beating the bushes trying to get another company in here to employ our people, that doesn’t make such sense. Let’s make sure our companies have what they need.”
To ensure absolutely everyone knows about Saturday’s job fair, Burke is taking to the air.
“We are going to hire an airplane to pull a banner and go all over Middle Tennessee advertising this,” Burke said. “That will probably be Thursday and Friday. We are in the process of finalizing that right now.”
Companies available during the job fair will be accepting résumés on site. For more information, contact the Industrial Development Board at 474-4769.