Skills City, USA – A National Model for Welfare to Workforce. Founded by Pastor Kyev Tatum, New Mount Rose Missionary Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Texas 76104

Skills City, USA – A National Model for Welfare to Workforce. Founded by Pastor Kyev Tatum, New Mount Rose Missionary Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Texas 76104. 

Fort Worth’s 76104 zip code holds the painful distinction of having the lowest life expectancy in the entire state of Texas. Years of disinvestment, generational poverty, racial trauma, and chronic underemployment have created a community that knows hardship far too well. Yet it is here—where the need is the greatest—that Skills City, USA is rising as a national model for transformation.

Rooted in the belief that faith can fuel freedom, Skills City, USA introduces a new faith-based Community Work Experience Program (CWEP) designed to help individuals move from welfare to the workforce with dignity, hope, and real opportunity. This program is centered around three pillars:

1. Trauma-Informed Care

2. Help While We Heal

3. Workforce Readiness and Skills Training

This innovative formula is proving that when people are treated as whole human beings—mind, body, and spirit—they are far more equipped to break cycles of poverty and step into purposeful work.

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Why a Trauma-Informed Care Model is Essential for Addressing Underemployment and Financial Hardship

Traditional welfare-to-work programs often assume that unemployment is solely a skills gap or motivation issue. But in communities like 76104, the deeper barrier is trauma—trauma from poverty, violence, discrimination, unstable housing, food insecurity, chronic stress, and systemic inequities.

A Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) approach recognizes that many individuals are not just unemployed—they are overburdened, overwhelmed, and overlooked. Trauma impacts every dimension of a person’s life, including:

• Cognitive functioning, which influences problem-solving and planning

• Emotional regulation, affecting stability, focus, and confidence

• Self-image, which shapes motivation and risk-taking

• Relationships, including trust in employers, institutions, and authority

• Physical health, which directly impacts attendance and performance

1. Trauma Affects Workforce Readiness More Than Skill Deficiency Does

Research shows that unresolved trauma can impair memory, decision-making, and executive functioning. These are the very abilities required for job retention, punctuality, communication, and the soft skills critical to workplace success.

When individuals are living in survival mode, job training alone is not enough. They need healing, stabilization, and supportive relationships to help them transition from crisis to competency.

Skills City, USA centers the belief that healed people become hired people.

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2. Trauma-Informed Care Creates Safe Spaces Necessary for Learning

Learning cannot happen in an environment that feels unsafe. Trauma-informed workspaces:

• Reduce anxiety

• Replace judgment with understanding

• Build trust through consistency

• Normalize struggle rather than penalize it

• Encourage vulnerability without fear of failure

For many in 76104, this is the first time they have been invited into a professional training setting where their life experiences are respected—not dismissed as excuses.

Skills City, USA offers a supportive environment, blending faith, community, and practical skill-building that creates psychological safety and promotes genuine growth.

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3. Trauma-Informed Programs Improve Job Retention

Most welfare-to-work programs emphasize job placement.

Skills City, USA emphasizes job retention.

A trauma-informed care model improves retention because it:

• Teaches coping strategies for stress and conflict

• Trains individuals in emotional intelligence and resilience

• Reduces shame and increases self-worth

• Provides mentors, community, and wraparound support

• Encourages healthy habits, routines, and boundaries

Employers consistently report that employees with emotional stability and resilience outperform those with technical skills alone. Skills City graduates are grounded, supported, and spiritually strengthened to stay the course.

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4. Trauma-Informed Care Acknowledges the Historical Realities of 76104

Fort Worth’s 76104 is not just a neighborhood; it is a historical landscape shaped by segregation, medical inequities, environmental injustice, generational poverty, and state-recognized lowest life expectancy. These are not isolated incidents—these are intergenerational traumas.

A trauma-informed workforce model validates these realities, confronts them directly, and offers people the tools to break free from cycles that were not created by their choices.

Healing becomes a form of justice.

Employment becomes a form of empowerment.

Work becomes a pathway to wellness.

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5. Faith-Based Trauma-Informed Care Addresses the Whole Person

Skills City, USA integrates:

• Spiritual grounding

• Mental health support

• Emotional literacy

• Financial coaching

• Hands-on skills training

• Community belonging

This holistic approach mirrors the biblical principle of help while we heal. In Scripture, healing and restoration often happen in community, not isolation. Skills City, USA brings that same biblical wisdom into modern workforce development.

It honors the idea that trauma may have been inherited, but transformation can be learned.

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The Skills City Promise: From Welfare to Workforce With Dignity

Skills City, USA is more than a program—it is a movement, a model, and a mission.

It declares that:

• People are not problems—they are possibilities.

• Poverty is not permanent when hope is present.

• Trauma is not the end of the story—transformation is.

• Workforce development must address wounds, not just résumés.

• Communities can heal when faith and innovation walk hand in hand.

By grounding welfare-to-work in trauma-informed care, Skills City, USA is providing the nation with a blueprint for how to restore lives, rebuild families, and revive entire zip codes.

Fort Worth 76104 may statistically have the lowest life expectancy in Texas—but with Skills City leading the way, it is quickly becoming a place where new life, new hope, and new opportunity are being born.