An electric wire plant in Richmond, Ind., is bucking the practice of rejecting job applicants who fail drug tests.
Doug Brenneke
Instead, the century-old Belden, a St. Louis-based company that also makes cable products, Internet routers, and other high-tech equipment, is offering Richmond plant applicants a job – if they complete a free 1- to 4-month drug treatment program.
The pilot program – called Pathways to Employment – aims to address two problems: the opioid crisis gripping the country and the worker shortage faced by many U.S. companies. Belden works with several local partners. The initiative was conceived with Mitchell S. Rosenthal, MD, a psychiatrist who serves as president of the Rosenthal Center for Addiction Studies and was founder of Phoenix House, the nonprofit drug treatment group. The program is thought to be the first of its kind.
in hiring the folks we needed,” said Doug Brenneke, Belden’s vice president of research and development, in an interview with National Public Radio.
Belden also is offering the program to the broader community – not just people who are part of the plant’s workforce. “We think part of the solution is offering basically a path out,” Mr. Brenneke told NPR. “It’s not a silver bullet, but it is part of an overall solution, we believe, to the epidemic.”
Click here to hear the NPR story.