September 12 2023 Minutes

Workforce Development Board Minutes

Employment Services - 315 N. 11th Ave, Bldg. B, Greeley, CO 80631
Meeting Location: First Floor Conference Room
Meeting: September 12, 2023 - 12:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m.

Board Members Present:
Aimee Hutson, Aunt Helens Coffee House; Alex Kloehn, Lutheran Family Services, Rocky Mountains; Bill Johnson, Yoder Family Companies; Casey Katofsky, Future Legends; Cecil Courtney, Denver Pipefitters Local 208; David Thompson, FMS Bank; David Zumbrun, Chicken Salad Chick; Elizabeth Barber, The Greeley Dream Team; Justin Booker, City of Greeley Fire Department and IAFF Professional Firefighter's Union, Local 888 - Greeley Firefighters; Lisa Taylor, The Weld Trust; Lori Cuno, Community Educational Outreach; Matthew Hortt, High Plains Library District; Michael Wailes, Weld RE-5J; Nick Spezza, Aims Community College; Phil MacHendrie, City of Greeley; Robert Rigg, Elder Construction; Victoria Cordova, Banner Health; Zach Huston, Chevron U.S.A. Inc.

Absent:
Amanda Ericson, HRx Services, Jill Eaton, Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, Kelly Folks, Colorado Department of Labor & Employment, Rich Werner, Upstate Colorado, Scott James, Weld County Board of County Commissioners, Shawn Croissant, Envision.

Quorum Present: Yes

Others Present: Andrew Chadwick, ESWC CeCe Majchrowski, ESWC Greg Cordova, ESWC Karina Amaya-Ragland, ESWC Ruth DeBoer, ESWC Tami Grant, Weld County DHS Jesus Borrego, CDLE Thomas Hartman, CWDC; Peter Hancock, Arapahoe WDB; Kelsey Baun.

  1. Call to Order: 12:01 pm
    • Introductions
    • Bill recognized Tami Grant for the great job she did delivering the talking points at the Workforce Development Proclamation in September.
  2. Changes to the Agenda: None
  3. Approval of Minutes - Motion to approve first by Phil MacHendrie, seconded by David Zumbrun 
  4. Unfinished Business
  5. Announcements, Updates, and Celebrations
    • Board Member Resignation
      1. Sylvia resigned; she took another position with her organization that prevents her from having the time to serve on the board any further. We now have an opening in the manufacturing sector; please share with people you know that you feel would be a good fit for this position. Have them contact Ruth.
    • Employment and Training Administration (ETA) Vision 2030 - 4 pillars
      1. Pillar 1 - Open Opportunities for Workers and Communities: Ensure programs focus on workers and communities who have been left behind – from reentry, to rural, to opportunity youth.
      2. Pillar 2 - Building a Better Care Economy: Support good jobs and protections for care workers – nursing, early care, elder care, mental health, and more – with a focus on low wage, diverse, young adult, and women workers.
      3. Pillar 3 - New industry Partnerships that Lead to Real, Good Jobs: Broker and build partnerships with business, training providers, and workers – including new entrants and youth – to ensure all training leads to good jobs across sectors.
      4. Pillar 4 - Action Today for Future of Work: Engage federal, state, and local leaders and the private sector now to prepare, support, and invest in workers and communities in preparation for jobs of the future and emerging industries.
      • ESWC Would like to get some volunteers for a 2–4-hour retreat to be able to create the new 4-year strategic plan. Please reach out to Ruth if you are interested.
      • Colorado is ahead of the game in the workforce area nationally.
      • CWDC has a good jobs initiative; there is a lot of work going into it, a couple of the local areas are jumping into it readily to get it going.
      • Bill Johnson pointed out that small businesses don’t have time to figure out what employees want now, so something like the Good Jobs initiative could assist with that. He asked the question “How can the WDB assist with that better? Can we include that in our strategic plan somehow? How can ESWC and the WDB work together to bridge this gap for individuals and businesses.” Thomas Hartman pointed to the CWDC's website as a good resource for businesses to use. https://cwdc.colorado.gov/job-quality, https://cwdc.colorado.gov/resources/colorado-talent-pipeline-report
      • Bill HB23-111-13 – David Zumbrun spoke on this matter, he worked diligently to get this bill put down as it put undue pressure on employers, Aimee Hutson agreed by saying that it would have put small businesses out of business. This perspective was valuable as Ms. Hutson and Mr. Zumbrun are both small business owners within the Weld Community.
    • Think Big Presentations
      1. Last week was the Think Big Conference, ESWC staff didn’t have to travel far as it was in Loveland. The WDB & ESWC want to thank Nora Myers and Jeff Smith for the work they put into organizing it and being part of the committee that planned it; they did phenomenal work!
      2. Weld County had great representation; including board members that presented.
        • Leslie Galindo, a Youth and Employment Training Navigator at ESWC, conducted a session with Project Search – Lisa Taylor, attended this session and was so impressed with what is happening here that she is seeing how Weld Trust can incorporate or implement something like this in other areas. Liz Barber noted that it was her favorite breakout session and was excited about the opportunities these youth were given.
        • Sylvia Robinson presented in a session; Matt Hortt presented as well and was amazed by the turnout for his session, he was encouraged and recommends that other board members go if they can.
        • Foster and Kinship within the workforce panel, conducted by ESWC's: Jasmin, Karina, Nora, and Greg as panelists and CeCe as the facilitator.
        • Andy Yost presented at a session called Careers in Construction: Opportunities and pathways for anyone and everyone. The session was regarding the Construction Sector Partnership's Career Pathways presentation that they do at high schools. I chair the education committee for the Construction Sector Partnership, so my role was just describing the outreach we do and the training we arrange for new presenters. The other two in the presentation were CSP board members that explained the role of the presentation and they provided an example as if the audience was a high school classroom.
        • Youth engagement and retention panel had 3 youth from Weld and 2 from Larimer.
        • Governor Summer Job Hunt award ceremony dinner: Weld had 1 youth that won the award.
        • Work out West was recognized as an employer for our 14- and 15-year-olds this year.
      • Partner Updates
        1. Job Corps Memorandum of Understanding
          • One of our requirements for the board is to create MOU's with partners within Weld County so that they participate in the infrastructure of the AJC. We received notice that the Feds were no longer supporting the agreement with Job Corps. Job Corps sent us a letter of non-renewal with an expiration date of 8/31/23. We did our due diligence and reached out to the new contractor that took over Job Corps and they are not currently serving in our area. They are limited to the western slope and a few other rural areas. They are now under the dept of forestry.
        2. Veterans Service Office (VSO)
          • ESWC is taking on a new team from Weld County. Facilities currently houses VSO in Weld County, but they are going to be moved under ESWC soon and 3 people will be moving into our building, and a 3rd will be hired; they will report to Jeff Smith. We are currently working on job descriptions and will get the 3rd person hired asap. They are really busy and are currently booked out through December. This is a great opportunity for better delivery of service to our veteran community. We hope to have a smooth transition for the employees coming over. Jeff has jumped in and is doing a lot of research on the state level in preparation of the move.
            Veterans Service Office (VSO)
      • Program Year 2022 Annual Monitoring
        1. CDLE has put the monitoring schedule for PY22; Tues Oct 3rd we will start our monitoring. They will spend 3 days in office and then 2 weeks doing a lot of the monitoring from their office and reaching out to us for information as they need it.
        2. There was only one measure that we did not meet at 90% last year, that was digital files. This is the first year we have done digital files 100% so it’ll be nice to see how we have done. The state pulls 20 files from each program to review.
  6. Board Focus
    • Weld Trust – Letter of Intent
      1. Through NoCo Works, Weld County applied for a grant to the Weld Trust, which would cover the cost of a website launch page for NoCo Works. We visited with weld trust last week and went over the information they want from us. Data points, stats, numbers from both Weld and Larimer. More to come as this progresses.
  7. Miscellaneous
    • PY22 Q4 Dashboard
      1. This is the final dashboard for PY22, we did well in all areas, we were able to carry in about 30% of funds for py23.
      2. We only served 82% of our goal for the amount of people that came into the workforce center.
      3. WBL – we did not hit as high as we wanted to. We are looking into this in py23 to see how we can improve these numbers.
      4. 80% or more of the people we serve are in the priority of service category.
      5. We did miss the goal/rate for WIOA AD, & WIOA DW employment rate 2 quarters after a person has left our program. We were just under 85% on both of those numbers and we want to be at 90%.
      6. Our dashboard for the first quarter will be given to you at our next meeting in November.
      7. We have the highest numbers in the state for vets being served, the state sets a goal of 48% being served and we are at 84%, and with VSO coming in our office very soon, we hope to see this continue to increase.
  8. Action Items
    • Policy Updates – Elizabeth Barber motioned to approve; David Thompson seconded.
      1. WIOA Title I Work Experience (Including Background Check Process)
        • The Feds have decided that if we have a supportive service to a youth in a program, we can submit that under a program grant.
        • We changed one language section from youth to participant to better serve everyone.
        • We do not support WE that are 100% virtual, but we will consider a hybrid program because we don’t have a way to prove people are doing the work they are put in. It also involves issues with Workman’s comp claims for when someone injures themselves in their own home.
      2. Eligible Training Providers for WIOA Title I Adult and Dislocated Worker Programs
        • We never had definitions of ETPL, so we added that in, LMI language was added. There are training centers that will send trainings to any workforce center in hopes of getting the training approved. Now that we have defined language this helps us weed out people that don’t offer credentials, etc. There was language added about what a trainer’s rights are when they are denied as an ETPL.
        • CWDC uses careerwise, it has been difficult to register apprenticeships through the feds, so being able to go through the state will make this much easier. Sep 21st there will be a presentation on this matter conducted by CWDC. Thomas will share with Ruth to send out to the board.
      3. Polis signed an executive order on Thursday to create more apprenticeship programs for Colorado. With the new executive order, Governor Polis is aiming to expand upon the 2022 directive to include other work-based learning programs in state government, including internships, pre-apprenticeships and fellowships.
        Among the goals outlined by Governor Polis included: Increasing the amount of Registered Apprenticeship Programs within state departments by 50% by June 30, 2024; increasing registered apprenticeships in the private sector by an additional 100 programs by June 30, 2024; creating 10 additional work-based learning programs by June 30, 2025; and directing each state department to implement at least two new work-based learning programs by Dec. 30, 2025.
    • Updates
      1. Youth Committee is meeting in south county next week, we are excited to have Connor and Olivia as co-chairs; they are actively involved in the planning process, they help come up with content and running the meeting. One of ESWC's youth employers, The Rusty Melon will be talking about what it’s like being an employer that ESWC uses, our youth reps will talk about what work experience/internship look like. We have our CTE from Roosevelt come and talk about Career Pathways.
      2. Greg wanted to give a shout out to Lisa and Liz for being great co-chairs!
    • Victoria Cordova, September is suicide prevention awareness month. 988 is a great number to call if you are worried, they can assist with calling 911 if necessary. Assessment, Referral Teams are in all hospitals and are more than happy to help in whatever ways they can. We have been putting a lot of things on LinkedIn about this, please repost. Then for our kids the I matter program is amazing, it is for anyone 18 and under. Don’t shy away if you are in a situation that concerns you, step up.
    • Andrew Chadwick, Awareness Committee, announced we are looking for more members for the committee. David Thompson, the committees chair, spoke up and invited board members to join; their next meeting is going to be around the future of the Awareness Committee.
    • Workforce Symposium is Sep 26th, Aunt Helens is catering, High Plains Library is providing laptops, NoCo works is formally launching its subcommittees to the public. The Symposium is being held at Aims Welcome Center.
  9. Adjournment – Motion to approve by Phil MacHendrie, Seconded by David Thompson.

Strategic Goals

Continue seeking clarity and improving connections for programs and services between Employment Services and the businesses and individuals in the Weld County Community.

Increase awareness and clarify the impact of Weld County's workforce network by attracting organizations and businesses to utilize the available funding provided to Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) targeted populations.

Increase Weld County Workforce Development Board (WCWDB) member engagement by involving board members in planning, leadership pipeline development, and committee involvement.

Working with intention by participating and supporting ESWC, sector partnerships, and their workgroups to ensure our regional workforce has equitable access to opportunities for quality, life-long education, and individual advancement to secure the future of work in Northern Colorado.

Board Recruitment

The following positions are vacant:
One Business Representative – Manufacturing
If you know someone interested in Workforce Initiatives and can fill one of these roles, please direct that person to Andrew Chadwick or CeCe Majchrowski.

Upcoming Events

Required Meeting: 11/14/2023; 11:45 AM to 1:30 PM 
Awareness Committee Meeting: 10/10/2023; 11:45 AM to 1:00 PM (12:00 PM-1:00 PM Virtual)
Youth Committee Meeting: 9/19/2023; 11:45 AM to 1:30 PM (12:00 PM-1:30 PM Virtual) 

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