With 1,700 jobs to fill at Baltimore's casino, the city and Caesars Entertainment have embarked on an unprecedented effort to make sure those jobs go to city residents.
For more than a year, the city and the owners of the Horseshoe Baltimore Casino have staged career fairs and workshops to recruit city residents. They have held special recruitment days at the city’s one-stop career centers, mass hiring events like one scheduled May 5-7 at M&T Bank Stadium and a recently completed job fair tour in each city council district.
Officials with the casino praised the efforts of Councilman Brandon Scott who notified the community about the job fair at the Furley Recreation Center through email blasts and community meetings and by walking the streets the day of the fair.
“The flow has been fantastic,” Joan Wilmer-Stewart, vice president of human resources for the Horseshoe, said at the fair. “The councilman that we’re partnering with, he has been wonderful.”
Denise Brown heard about the fair at a community meeting. She was laid off in December from St. Vincent de Paul but says it came at the right time.
“In early February, my mother has chronic lymphedema and she was hospitalized for two months,” says Brown. With her mother doing better and her severance package about to end, Brown is hoping to be hired as a full-time trainer. “I was a case manager; so I did training of students there so I have training experience,” she adds.
Caesars not only wants to take care of its employees, but their families as well, Wilmer Stewart said.
“We take the family concept very seriously and that’s why people who are typically with us, stay with us for an average of 10-20 years.”
She said her company wants to see the same stories for the Baltimore casino.
Benefits include full health and wellness coverage and tuition reimbursement.