Dr. Evil Unemployment |
The Central Florida workforce development board thought it would be a great idea to hand out 6,000 shiny red superhero capes to unemployed people.
After word got out, the plan was met with widespread derision and scrapped.
The Orlando Sentinel reports:
Dubbed the ‘Cape-A-Bility Challenge,’ it was slated to be part of a public-relations campaign featuring a cartoon character named ‘Dr. Evil Unemployment.’ The capes cost about $14,200 and foam cutouts of ‘Dr. Evil Unemployment’ cost another $2300.Now there's a request for an investigation. (Must be hard to know where to begin figuring out how something that stupid got started.)
Here's the original Orlando Sentinel story:
The region's federally funded jobs agency is spending more than $73,000 on a media campaign to raise awareness of its services...
To win a cape, a contestant can become a Workforce Central Florida fan on Facebook, take a Facebook quiz — "What Superhero Are You?" — or have a photo taken with a foam cutout of Dr. Evil Unemployment.
Job seekers and employers who participate become eligible to win a $1,000 prize package, featuring gift cards from Visa, Barnes & Noble and the U.S. Postal Service. Job seekers can also win $125 worth of résumé paper. Only two prize packages will be given away.We note there are 20 "likes" on the agency's Facebook page. We want to meet those 20 people.