 An email bulletin on national
issues, exclusively for NAWB
members | |
|
Last Thursday, the Senate passed, on a 52-47 vote, a five-year budget reconciliation package of approximately $35 billion. The House plans to bring its more stringent budget reconciliation package, currently at about $54 billion, to the House floor this week. Should the House package pass—which is predicted to be difficult, as it would cut food stamps, child support enforcement, Medicaid, and student loan programs—the budget reconciliation package will still face a rough road going into conference. House and Senate conferees may not be able to come to agreement before adjournment this year. On October 28th, President Bush submitted to Congress a proposed rescission and reallocation package. It would rescind $2.3 billion of unexpended or unobligated funds from 55 federal programs out of prior year appropriations. Some affected programs would include Job Corps, the Tech Prep Demonstration program, and the Responsible Reintegration of Youth Offenders Program. The reallocation proposal would shift $17 billion of funds already appropriated for FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund to a variety of purposes, including small-business assistance, job training, social services, and other purposes as part of the hurricane recovery effort. As reported in NAWB's e-mail alert earlier last week, the Senate passed 94-3 H.R. 3010, the FY 2006 appropriations bill, which includes funding for the Department of Labor and its various programs. There were no major changes in funding for WIA formula programs compared to FY 2005. Since the Senate version of the bill provides $3.2 billion more in funding for discretionary programs than the House bill, a compromise bill will be difficult to achieve. Washington insiders speculate that across-the-board cuts in discretionary spending of approximately 2% will become a reality. The amendment to H.R. 3010 proposed by Senators Dole and Cornyn, which would have increased funding for community college training grants by $125 million to the President's proposed $250 million level, was withdrawn. The additional $125 million was to be made available partly by reducing WIA dislocated worker formula funding by $45 million. As of November 7th, a conference to iron out differences in the House and Senate versions of H.R. 3010 has not yet been scheduled. Recipients Selected for USDOL’s New Freedom Initiative Awards Three businesses, three non-profit organizations, and one individual have been honored with the Secretary of Labor's New Freedom Initiative Award for outstanding support of employment for people with disabilities. The award recognizes exemplary and innovative efforts to train, recruit, and hire people with disabilities. For more information and biographies of the recipients, see http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/odep/odep20052078.htm.
State News, Arizona
The U.S. Department of Labor announced recently that it has awarded a grant of $3.4 million to raise the skills of Arizona technology workers. SQE certifications from IBM. Development of educational materials will be done in collaboration with the technical development education team at IBM and partner community colleges. For more information, see http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/eta/eta20051964.htm.
Not surprisingly, there were record increases in unemployment in Louisiana and Mississippi in September of 2005. The jobless rate in Louisiana reached 11.5%, jumping 5.7 percentage points from August to September. In Mississippi, unemployment reached 9.6%. Also, there were large cuts in overall payroll in these two states— 251,000 jobs in Louisiana and 60,000 in Mississippi. For more information, see the Bureau of Labor Statistics website at www.bls.gov.
|
Vol V Issue 6 IN THIS ISSUE:
National Association of Workforce Boards |