SANDY, Utah (ABC 4 News) Now hiring: 1,600 workers in Salt Lake County, full and part-time positions available. Work begins in February, and ends in August. Vangent is a subcontractor for the 2010 U.S. Census. It has the daunting task of filling a 130,000 square feet call center, with hundreds of employees, in a matter of weeks. Steven Gift, director of call center operations, says “We are lucky to be in Utah when a lot of people need work.”
Gift says Utah was selected for the nation’s largest call center because of the quality of its workforce. “Sandy was chosen by Vangent due to a great quality workforce, in addition to a lot of folks who are able to speak foreign languages.” Those who are hired will be answering questions from people nationwide about how to fill out Census forms, or calming their fears about what the Census is.
The Census, which occurs ever ten years, aims to get an accurate picture of the size and makeup of the U.S. population. The 2010 Census will help determine how federal money is allocated. The goal is to count everyone. Steve Gift says right now they are looking for mostly those who speak English, but they are also searching diligently for those who speak Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Russian. “Our biggest challenge is to fill our Korean speaking agency here in Utah, so we are looking heavily to try to find folks who speak Korean.”
Because of the sensitive nature of the information being gathered by the Census, Gift says those who apply will need to undergo a security background check that includes fingerprinting. “Part of being in a government project is to make sure we keep all of the data that is collected very secure, and so we want to make sure that anybody we hire is able to pass a government security background check.” Those who apply will also need a high school diploma or better, customer service experience is preferred.
The pay scale is between eleven and sixteen dollars an hour, depending on shift and skill level. Those interested should log onto
www.vangent.com once on their website, click on 2010 Census, and the select Utah.
