Culinary academy looks to the future with expansion

Eric Leake

Monday, Feb. 17, 2003 | 8:38 a.m.

The Culinary Training Academy breaks ground on a new facility today in an effort to generate more jobs.

The 25,000-square-foot, $5 million school is a joint venture of the gaming and resort industry, the Culinary and Bartender unions and the nonprofit Nevada Partners. It is expected to more than double the school's current output of 2,500 annual graduates to 6,000.

Academy Chief Executive Officer Steven Horsford said he expects a steady supply of jobs despite an increased rate of unemployment.

"The jobs are there. It's ebb and flow, but it's consistent," he said. "The problem is when there is a huge need, there are not always the people. That's where we fill the gap.

"We're preparing for the future growth in the industry."

The latest state figures chart unemployment in the Las Vegas metropolitan area -- including Clark and Nye counties in Nevada and Mohave County in Arizona -- at 5 percent, compared with 4 percent in December 2000. The December data estimated 41,200 people were looking for work, compared with 31,700 two years ago.

The rising unemployment came with the end of the economic boom in the 1990s, said Karen Rhodes, spokeswoman for the state Department of Employment, Training, and Rehabilitation. Still Nevada has been more fortunate than some.

The nation's unemployment rate in December was 6 percent, compared with 3.9 percent two years ago.

"Right now Nevada is better than much of the nation, but we're still fragile due to economic concerns outside of our control," Rhodes said.

She points out that the service industry led the state with the creation of 9,800 new jobs last year.

Those are jobs Horsford says his graduates will fill. He says the nonprofit academy answers the unemployment riddle of how to get a job without experience, and experience without a job.

"In most positions, even to be a maid, you have to have six months prior experience on the Strip. If you go through our program, our training counts in lieu of that," Horsford said.

Training curriculum includes class and workshop time and classes last two to 15 weeks. Most students receive grants to pay for the training, which was developed in part by the casinos to mirror the demands of the industry, Horsford said.

According to academy figures, more than 80 percent of graduates are placed in positions. Many of them are minorities and new residents.

The new facility at 710 W. Lake Mead Blvd. is a expansion of the Nevada Partners building. It will replace the decade-old center on Fremont Street and is funded through federal, county and city grants as well as $2 million in matching business money.

The school will include a new kitchen, a public restaurant and nine additional classrooms at completion, which is scheduled for the end of next year.

The center is right to focus on future job growth, economics professor Keith Schwer of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas said.

"In the type of activity here, in terms of training for employment, these long-term outlooks are far more important than short-term," he said.

Schwer added that the culinary industry is typically a little more insulated from unemployment than its counterparts.

"Everybody likes to eat sometime during the day," he said.