COEUR d'ALENE - Mark Cotner, director of Kootenai Technical Education Campus, said educators should share his primary goal.

They must make sure students graduating from high school and community and four-year colleges can earn enough money in their jobs to feed themselves, he said.

"I truly believe that," said Cotner, who was the keynote speaker Tuesday at the Jobs Plus annual meeting at The Coeur d'Alene Resort. Jobs Plus Inc. is a nonprofit economic development corporation formed in 1987 that works to expand and diversify the employment base in Kootenai County.

Cotner said KTEC - a joint venture of the Coeur d'Alene, Lakeland and Post Falls school districts and Kootenai County businesses - works to meet that goal.

He said many who want to enroll at KTEC are advanced placement students seeking industry certifications and hands-on experience through one- and two-year course programs.

KTEC, located in Rathdrum, has programs in diesel technology, computer repair and networking, construction trades, automotive technology, health professions, welding and fabrication, automation manufacturing-engineering, and resort management.

"Just because a kid goes to KTEC doesn't mean he's not going on to college," he said.

Kids going to KTEC are as likely to get a job right after completing courses as they are to continue on with their education and earn a bachelor's degree. Or they might get a job and continue their education at night.

He criticized high schools for graduating students with no specific career skills or opportunities.

"Your valedictorians, and I'm not picking on them, are qualified to go to work at Walmart and McDonald's," he said.

Because opportunities to gain job skills like those taught at KTEC are so limited in the county the demand from students and their families has been through the roof, he said. KTEC has received 920 applications for 280 seats.

He promised results, but he also asked for regular feedback and input from business leaders in the county and North Idaho.

He will be providing monthly and annual updates about how many kids are landing jobs after completing programs and what their starting salaries are by program area, he said.

"We're going to look at output," he said. "My product from my little factory over there are my graduates."

His customers are the business owners and managers in the county that helped make KTEC a reality, he said.

"You're going to see programs change on an annual basis depending on where our local industries' needs are," he said.

In a separate presentation, Jobs Plus President Steve Griffitts said the nonprofit is halfway to reaching his goal of helping the organization attract 10,000 new jobs to the county.

"That's what gets me up in the morning - the fact that 10,000 families could be positively affected by what we do," he said Tuesday.

He said Jobs Plus-recruited companies in the county paid $54 million during the past 25 years in real and personal property taxes.

In 2011, those companies paid $4.9 million in property taxes. Meanwhile, Jobs Plus' expenses in 2011 reached nearly $308,000.

"I don't know of a greater return on investment as long as those taxes are used properly," Griffitts said.

Overall, Jobs Plus-recruited companies finished last year with an employment base of 5,445 jobs, up from 5,071 just two years ago.

Meanwhile, the labor force in the county has grown as well.

"We're still getting people entering the workforce, (and) we're still getting people that are moving to our area," Griffitts said. "That brings a lot of vitality, vibrancy (and) newness."