Dear Tool Companies of America

Mike Rowe here, Dirty Jobs, etc. My foundation is supporting a pre-apprenticeship program in Baltimore City called Project Jumpstart. The program has been around about ten years, and done a rather amazing job at training non-violent ex-offenders for jobs in the construction trades. In fact, I think it’s fair to say the overall success of the program is unparalleled. The placement rates among graduates are staggeringly good, the local construction industry is positively thrilled, and hundreds of individual lives have been dramatically transformed. For the life of me, I can’t understand why every major city hasn’t followed Baltimore’s lead, but that’s another matter.

This year, mikeroweWORKS is going to help pay for the tools that every Jumpstart graduate will need to ply their trade. I’m writing because frankly, tools are expensive, and my foundation would rather not pay retail. Wholesale would be nice. Free would be even better. But first things first.

Please give the attached video a look. It’s short. It’s sweet. It features big-shots from both sides of the aisle, along with a certain B-List celebrity best known for crawling through sewers. If nothing else, watching it will make you feel better about your fellow man. (But not nearly as good as giving me a break on the cost of tools.)

Much obliged,
Mike

Mike’s Facebook Page