Cascade Engineering program saves the state nearly $1 million

According to excerpts from the story:

In 1981, Fred P. Keller started a company in Grand Rapids to turn plastic into garbage cans, parts of office chairs and stuff like that “to show that you can run a business that cares about people and still makes money.”

So, the good-hearted guy tried to help the homeless and people on public aid into jobs they could keep.

By about 2001, the company developed the Welfare to Career program, where the turnover rate is a mere 2 percent to 3 percent per month, he said.

And the company estimates it saved the public assistance system nearly $1 million in one year, said Barrett, who told the company’s story Wednesday to a group of mostly social service leaders in St. Joseph County who would like to see businesses here do the same.

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