The Utah Reauthorization Project (UREAP) wishes to convey our views regarding key differences in several important provisions between Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Reauthorization legislation passed by the House of Representatives and Senate. We understand that a Conference Committee may be named and begin its negotiations soon; we are providing this document to each conferee, as well as to members of the Utah Congressional Delegation. We will reference HR 1261 "Workforce Investment and Adult Education Act of 2003," passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on May 8, and S. 1627/Amended HR 1261 (hereinafter referred to as S. 1627 or the "Senate Bill" to avoid confusion) "Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Reauthorization," passed by the Senate on November 14, 2003. From our previous communications, please recall UREAP's official membership includes 28 entities with a broad variety of experience and expertise and has statewide coverage (members and jurisdictions listed below). Over 400 people receive information through an email list and a web site (http://www.slcap.org/UREAP/ureap.htm) and, in turn, share it with colleagues. Input into UREAP's activities and communications is accomplished via the email list and monthly meetings.
Conferees will need to decide how to proceed on a number of provisions reflecting dramatic differences of approach between the House and Senate Bills. UREAP has taken positions on a number of these provisions, based on a set of Principles developed early in our study of WIA reauthorization issues. We understand that the conference committee process has the potential of operating in a spirit of compromise. However, we wish to remind conferees that while HR 1261 bearly managed to pass the House, the Senate version passed with Unanimous Consent, after a lengthy process focused on obtaining information and input from knowledgable, interested entities. We participated in that process and concur with a number of groups and organizations expressing strong preference for important provisions as dealt with by the Senate. We have grave concerns about the approach taken by the Administration and the House Bill. Immediately below is a summary listing of our recommendations about provisions related to our Principles. Following this summary listing, each recommendation is restated and accompanied by discussion of the rationale for our views.
Summary of Recommendations
Restatement of Recommendations and Rationale
S. 1627 allows up to 60 percent of funding to be spent on in-school youth; current law allows up to 70 percent. HR 1261 restricts such expenditures to 30 percent, vastly reducing states' ability to attempt to keep at risk children in school. Forcing states to commit the majority of funding to drop-outs sacrifices opportunities for prevention. It also ignores the fact that children often "disappear" after they dropout and cannot be found to offer services. There is need to devote more resources to services to support all vulnerable children, but in-school youth should not be abandoned.
UREAP participants, including members of the State and local Workforce Councils, report effective partnerships between WIA youth services employment counselors and high school counselors. In one region of the state, the Mountainland DWS/Education Youth Services Partnership identifies and provides services to at-risk students. Through this model, the region is serving 320 children--67 percent are still in school and 33 percent are not. We are told that this partnership has been commended by the Department of Labor, Denver Office. Such important work in this and other states is based on the flexibility for states to determine their own approaches to serve this important group of children--including those still in school.
HR 1261, however, would force Utah to end to this approach by mandating that the state focus on out-of-school youth at the expense of services to at-risk youth who are still in school. This, we believe, is unwise, as well as unnecessarily takes away state control over an extremely local issue. Although HR 1261 reserves one-third of funds allotted to states to low-income youth, this is not adequate to fund the important chance we have to prevent children from dropping out.
If there is any place within WIA legislation that allows us to make an investment in prevention, it is through continued commitment to in-school youth. President Bush justified his proposal to focus almost entirely on out-of-school youth by indicating that available funding is stretched too thin. A Department of Labor spokesperson expanded on that by saying that, while educators provide drop-out prevention services to in-school youth, no program exists to serve youth who have already dropped out. We cannot afford to assume that disadvantaged children who are still in school will stay there or that, without concerted support, they will learn the skills they will need while there. If it is thought that more focus is needed on out-of-school children than is currently being given, the Administration and Congress should find a better way to send that message than by mandating that states turn their WIA services away from in-school children.
UREAP has consistently counseled against block granting WIA Adult, WIA Dislocated Worker, and Wagner-Peyser funding streams (and the resultant repeal of the WagnerPeyser Act as provided by the House Bill) to facilitate our goal that congressional commitment to adequate funding for Workforce Investment Act programs is restored. We believe collaboration and integration can be accomplished effectively without block granting and we are concerned that block granting may risk a reduction in accountability needed to ensure that various groups of vulnerable adults are served. We therefore continue to support the Senate Bill's approach over the House Bill's provision to block grant these programs as the best means at our disposal to protect WIA program funding.
However, we will take this opportunity to express our dismay upon noting that funding reduction is, indeed, the intent of the Administration, whether or not block granting is accomplished as part of WIA reauthorization. This is shown in the FY 2005 Budget Recommendation recently released. We believe it is a serious mistake to continue to erode support for the workforce development system. As we continue to see unacceptable levels of joblessness, underemployment, and a increasing percentage of available jobs in sectors guaranteeing low wages and a lack of benefits, this is not the time to be reducing the only services that can offer any hope of reversing this alarming trend. We understand that the gravity of this situation is beyond the scope of the current Conference Committee, rather it will take concerted work during the FY 2005 appropriations process by both parties and chambers in Congress.
While we do not view WIA legislation as a social services program and we are not counseling total focus on serving low-income/disadvantaged workers, we see reducing the role of their prevalence in distribution of funds as counterproductive. Economic analysis done by Utah's Department of Workforce Services demonstrates the tremendous challenges faced by states seeking to develop the entire workforce and provides clear evidence that the challenges are greatest and longest-term for the tier that is the most disadvantaged. This tier is the last to be positively impacted by economic upswing and the first to lose ground in a downturn. To the extent that more disadvantaged workers are truly assisted to join the mainstream or more prepared tier in the labor market, their contributions increase and their dependency on social services programs declines. The Senate bill does a better job of recognizing this reality than the House bill.
We are highly supportive of a change to the current law that will effect greater flexibility in the delivery of core, intensive, and training services. Both bills do this. However, we find the Senate's choice of language emphasizing "self-sufficiency" preferable to that of the House Bill ("suitable employment"), which seems quite vague and difficult to define).
For reasons noted above, it is in the best interests of the community to place primary focus on enabling displaced and disadvantaged people to obtain training to prepare themselves for employment at family-sustaining wages. In this and other areas, HR 1261 appears to us to reduce that focus. We are doubly concerned, given the oft-forgotten fact that the "official" definition of "unemployed" includes only a portion of those people who actually need and want jobs. This restrictive definition may exert a negative impact on funding for programs if the House approach is adopted.
UREAP agrees with the Administration and the House that WIA reauthorization should create a way to fund the cost of the One-Stop system. However, allowing Governors complete control to take administrative funds from One-Stop partners as the first and only option is not advisable. The Senate "State Infrastructure Funding mechanism" permits negotiation, includes caps that are less likely to have a negative impact on services and promises better outcomes. S. 1627 allows intervention by the Governor as a final alternative, if agreement cannot be reached by the local parties.
Utah's Independent Living Centers and other programs serving people with disabilities are adamantly opposed to becoming mandatory One-Stop Partners. The resulting loss of program focus and specialty service are repeatedly cited as reasons to remain independent. The prescriptive approach in HR 1261 to funding for One-Stop Infrastructure costs makes partnership especially unwelcome and threatening to program services as administrative funds are withdrawn.
Section 402 of HR 1261 proposes to change the appointment process for the Commissioner of the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA). Current law requires that the Commissioner be appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. HR 1261 would put the Commissioner in the Department of Education, instead of in the Office of the Secretary of Rehabilitation Services and would make the position a Secretarial appointment, rather than a presidential one. Downgrading of the Office of the RSA Commission sends the message to people with disabilities that the public Vocational Rehabilitation Program is downgraded as a priority. This is the wrong direction to go.
A Department of Labor spokesperson reviewed the reason for this change with UREAP participants, citing a simple desire for better administrative balance within the Office structure. UREAP participants representing the Association for Independent Living in Utah (AILU), the Utah Statewide Living Council (USILC), and the Utah State Office of Rehabilitation (USOR) considered this information, but remain convinced that, as a practical matter, this change will diminish the RSA Commissioner position, however unintentionally from the Administration's perspective.
WIA reauthorization is a matter of great concern to Utah. Utah is one of the few states that has reorganized its administrative structure to offer both TANF and many WIA services under the same roof--the Utah Department of Workforce Services--implementing both programs at roughly the same time. As other states have found, bringing up each/both of these far-reaching laws has been tremendously challenging and, regardless of the improvements that may be promised to clients and customers when programs and services are fully functioning, dramatic changes in systems are unavoidably disruptive.
By 2004, our new workforce system is moving forward and struggling to meet the increased needs for services brought on by a declining economy and attendant higher unemployment, rising welfare caseloads, and state budget crisis. We note our enthusiasm for the Cantwell amendment to restore WIA funding to 2002 levels. This comes at a time when it is impossible to avoid dismay over the recent trend to under-funding, coupled with what appears to us to be unfounded, administratively burdensome tinkering with WIA programs. We urge Conference Committee members to renew this nation's commitment to a sound workforce development system through positive changes and funding restorations and increases we have recommended in this communication. Likewise, we urge you to avoid measures that seek to "fix" what is not "broken" in the current law and the unnecessary, counterproductive disruptions they promise.
We hope that before you cast your final votes, all Conferees will have ample opportunity to learn from constituents and WIA administrators about impacts that some elements of House and Senate bills will have on their ability to ensure continuity of service. We appreciate this and previous opportunities to share our views with you. Much has been learned in these early years of the Workforce Investment Act and we are excited with the opportunity brought by the reauthorization process to build on that knowledge.
Sincerely,
for the Utah Reauthorization Project and its members:
Active Re-Entry, Price, (Southeastern Utah)For more information about UREAP, including correspondence with Utah's Congressional Delegation and other elected officials, we invite you to visit our website at www.slcap.org/UREAP/ureap.htm. There are also links to Utah research at that site.
C:\UREAPII\UREAPconferencecommitteerecns.wpd