Refugees and immigrants searching for new jobs recently got the opportunity to meet with more than a dozen businesses at a job fair at Lexington's North Side Library.

The partnership between the Lexington Public Library and the Kentucky Refugee Ministries is meant to eliminate barriers for English language learners and employers in the community.

We know that the job market has been good for a variety of people, though those with some barriers still need extra support.

And that's where we at the library have decided to partner with Kentucky Refugee Ministries in order to help the members of our community who might have barriers such as English language learners, newcomers, immigrants, migrants and others in our community.

And so a lot of our clients right now are coming from like Western Africa, so like Congo, Rwanda, Tanzania.

We had a big influx of Ukrainians come in.

Most of them are in Nichols ville.

We have people coming from Afghanistan, Jordan, So anywhere in the world you can think of, we probably have them coming here.

It's important to have an event like this because there are so many from other countries that are seeking employment, and I feel like this is going to help them.

And also there are many people with a lot of barriers of life and so I feel like that this gives them a chance to improve.

And learning English is very difficult.

And so it takes it takes time.

I can imagine just being somewhere totally new, don't know anybody, barely have any help.

And then you expect me to go and work at a job that I don't know anything.

I just it's so difficult.

A lot of times the main difficulty is getting their certification to translate here.

Right.

And it's and English is the barrier.

So that's why a lot of times you feel like they're slotted into certain certain professions, right?

Housekeeping, agriculture, work.

And we you know, if our clients want to work in those positions, we will get them in those positions.

Right.

But there's there's lots of other things that they're able to do.

Manufacturing and and as much as we can get English to be not a barrier, these clients will will come with certifications, come with training to be able to work in a variety of backgrounds.

So we work with a variety of employers and a lot of our employers will have a variety of positions.

And so it's all about finding a fit.

I think it shows the community that we have a variety of speakers and ethnicities in our community who call Lexington home and that we should embrace individuals who are here, notwithstanding, wherever they may have originated.

I think businesses benefit from being able to talk to a labor force that is just really untapped.

It's in the business's interest.

If you want to be fully staffed, if you want to, if you want to make contact with with workers that are excited that our take will take pride in their work, I always recommend our clients.

We think the integration and communication just demonstrates that we all have the same basic need to feed our families to grow and enrich our communities and be civically engaged.

Yeah, Kentucky Ministries said each job opportunity paid $15 an hour and included traditional employee benefits.