Workforce Investment report is positive, despite declining budget

A positive effort by the Merced County Department of Workforce Investment to fill the needs of employers with a prepared and fully knowledgeable work force was the subject of a verbal report presented during the Tuesday meeting of the Merced County Board of Supervisors by Brian Cutler, the department’s acting Executive Director.

The year-end report for 2010 to 2011 showed that from June 30, 2010 to July 1, 2011, the total number of visitors to the Department of Workforce Investment, including repeat visitors, was 78,961. For that year, the number of first-time visitors was 5,199.

Cutler reported, “People who come in are very frustrated. They have often been out of the work force for a long period of time.”

According to Cutler, the Business Resources activity is a key component of the Department. During the year, 1,544 businesses received services, such as help with recruitment, training, internships, and Enterprise Zone issues.

Cutler said, “The Department is the Enterprise Zone manager for the County. In an expansion to the zone, we incorporated 151 new businesses into the area.”

As to whether jobs are available in Merced County, Cutler reported, “There are certain industries that are just flat. Some workers might simply need enhancement.
If they come from an industry where we don’t see much future growth, we do job transitioning. Having a trained work force for the jobs available is challenging.”

Regarding meeting its goal of keeping pace with the growth of the economy, he continued, “We have five demand industries for which we need to make sure training is available. The demand industries have the most jobs, the most growth, and the most potential for the future. They are agribusiness, including food processing, agricultural technology, and bio-technology; manufacturing; supply chain management and logistics; health and medical care; and renewable energy.”

Explaining how the Department computes which are the demand industries, Cutler said, “CCWC, a nine-county consortium in San Joaquin County, gets together every six weeks to discuss matters pertinent to our situations. We are the group that comes out with the demand industries, and it’s based on employment statistics for the region.”

Addressing funding for the Department’s operations, Cutler said, “Our formula funding shrinks every year.”

On a positive note, he reported that between Feb. 17, 2009 and June 30, 2011, the Department received $8,536,898 in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds.

He said, “The grants were an extra injection of funds into a lot of things we already do, and were also used for youth programs. We were able to put a lot of money into the local economy by having people actually go to work and be paid, even though it was minimum wage for the most part, but they were learning how to do jobs, and they spent their paychecks locally hopefully which injected some life into our local economy.”

The Department also received grant money designed to help dislocated workers and veterans.

Cutler said, “Some of the grants don’t run the fiscal year, but they were all effective during that year.”

He reported, “We have adult, dislocated worker, and youth funding streams, and we have exceeded every goal in our adult program and our dislocated worker program.”

Looking to the future, Cutler announced that the Department’s six goals for 2012 are: Comprehensive programs for employment and life skills for youth and adults; facilitating resources and networks to help businesses succeed; influencing work force legislation and regulations; improving one-stop effectiveness and quality; Board development strategies, public awareness and outcomes; and Workforce Investment Board system to gather business data.

At the end of the presentation, Merced County Board of Supervisors Chairman Hub Walsh asked Cutler about moving workers from the Employment Development Department office in Los Banos when it is closed by the State.

Cutler said, “EDD administers our program at the State level, and it is closing its satellite office in Los Banos. We’re trying to keep the workers in Los Banos since we have a Los Banos office. It’s an idea we’re discussing.”

In other Merced County Board of Supervisors news, County Redevelopment Agency is being dissolved During the meeting, Mark Hendrickson, the county’s Director of Commerce, Aviation and Economic Development, explained that the county’s Redevelopment Agency, established in 2003 to eliminate blight at Castle, will be dissolved.

According to Hendrickson, there was legislation to dissolve the RDA’s unless the Board agreed to a payment. The Board did agree, but the payment program was invalidated by a court ruling. As a result, all RDA’s will be dissolved on Feb. 1, 2012.

Hendrickson explained that the dissolution for the county will not be complex since the county’s RDA has no enforceable obligations, no housing assets and no third party obligations outstanding. The successor entity will return any housing funds to the County Auditor for disbursal.

Hendrickson explained that although the dissolving of RDA’s is disappointing, there is legislation being explored to keep the tool alive.

Supervisor Deidre Kelsey commented, “We have other mechanisms [for Castle] because we are the county, and it is county property.”