Processing Your Payment

Please do not leave this page until complete. This can take a few moments.

December 30, 2022

Longtime head of Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board announces plans to step down

Contributed Catherine Awwad has announced plans to step down from top post at the Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board, with a targeted exit at the end of June.
By Michael Puffer

Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board President and CEO Catherine Awwad – long a key player in Waterbury-area politics and economic development – recently announced plans to step down from the top role at the federally funded jobs training organization.

Awwad joined the NRWIB in 2001, when it had a $3 million budget and provided jobs training and support services for 12 municipalities. Today, the organization has a $20 million budget and serves 41 cities and towns. Her notice of resignation letter left her exit open ended, in order to allow the agency flexibility in its search for new leadership. Awwad says she hopes to step down around the end of June.

Awwad, 61, says she feels the time is right for her to step back and let someone else lead the agency. She is, however, hoping to stay on in a supporting capacity for an extended period to help her successor with the complexities of navigating various grants and the agency’s web of services.

“I’m very proud of the growth of the agency,” Awwad said. “I want to be able to support the new leadership so that growth can continue.”

The NRWIB offers training in manufacturing, banking and healthcare, as well as niche jobs like industrial sewing, seasonal farm work and brownfields remediation. The board offers programs for youth employment as well. It operates jobs centers in Waterbury, Torrington and Danbury.

Awwad said the agency has trained tens-of-thousands during her tenure. Awwad said she and her staff have worked to keep it on the “cutting edge” of workforce development, consulting employers to develop curriculum tailored to existing and emerging workforce needs.

Awwad, 61, also plans to relinquish the presidency of the volunteer board of the Waterbury Development Corp. This quasi-public agency organizes economic and civic development projects for the City of Waterbury, everything from multi-million-dollar park upgrades to cleanup of polluted industrial properties.

Awwad, a Republican, has played a major supporting role in Waterbury-area government for decades. She served on Waterbury’s Board of Public Works and Board of Aldermen in the 1990s. More recently, Mayor Neil O’Leary appointed her repeatedly to serve out the terms of resigned members of the Board of Education. Awwad offered an intelligent, insightful examination of spending and programs, hammered home by a direct, no-nonsense approach.

“Cathy Awwad is the hardest-working woman I have ever met in my life,” Waterbury Mayor Neil O’Leary said, noting with humor she sends him texts anywhere from 3:45 a.m. to 11 p.m. “I’m hoping to talk her into staying on as (WDC) board chair just a little bit longer.”

O’Leary is a conservative-leaning Democrat. And even though Awwad is Republican, he has repeatedly tapped her for important tasks, such as the WDC board, as well as another board tasked with leading the redevelopment of the shuttered Anamet manufacturing complex on 17 acres along South Main Street.

O’Leary said he is also hoping to see Awwad remain in some capacity at the workforce board for a period.

“I’m glad she’s going to take time now and enjoy it and not have the weight of the world on her shoulders as she has for so many years with the workforce board,” O’Leary said. “That is a really complex job and she’s mastered it, and that says an awful lot for her.”

Sign up for Enews

Most Recent

Most Recent

0 Comments

Order a PDF