The Hospitality Training Academy in Los Angeles is a partnership between employers and Unite Here Local 11, a union representing the area's hospitality workers.

Its programs include training for line cooks, prep cooks and others, help with English skills, and more.

It's also working on training for baristas and bartenders, said Adine Forman, the Academy's executive director.

-These are folks that sometimes fall into homelessness and we view our program as one of those many interventions or one of the many solutions to homelessness.

-The Academy relies on local, state, and federal grants for most of its funding, including money from California's High Road Training Partnership, a program that aims to train workers for jobs that pay a living wage, offer benefits, provide safe working conditions and opportunities for moving up, while providing a pipeline of qualified workers for different industries.

-We have been really successful in obtaining that funding so that these students pay zero for this program.

There is no cost whatsoever.

-Last year, 163 people graduated from the Academy's Apprenticeship Line Cook Program, all of whom were placed into union jobs at hotels, stadiums, Disneyland and USC.

Of that number, 94% were people of color and the graduates' starting wages ranged from $19.92 an hour to $27.89 an hour.

-Everyone that I've met here so far has been so supportive and they are the answer to the prayers that I had years ago when I was just asking for help.

-The Academy has seen enough success that in September, it received almost $3 million from the US Labor Department to help scale its Registered Apprenticeship Program in Chicago, Philadelphia and Baltimore.

For CalMatters, I'm Levi Sumagaysay.