BILL NUMBER: AB 1910 ENROLLED
BILL TEXT
PASSED THE SENATE AUGUST 20, 2014
PASSED THE ASSEMBLY AUGUST 22, 2014
AMENDED IN SENATE AUGUST 18, 2014
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MAY 5, 2014
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MARCH 28, 2014
INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Gray
(Coauthor: Assembly Member Fox)
FEBRUARY 19, 2014
An act to add Division 11 (commencing with Section 19000) to the
Unemployment Insurance Code, relating to workforce investment.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1910, Gray. California Workforce Investment Board: San Joaquin
Valley Regional Planning and Preparedness Act of 2014.
Existing law declares that a well-educated and highly skilled
workforce is necessary for the state to remain competitive in the
global economy and that workforce investment programs and services
need to work collaboratively with state and local entities to
accomplish this policy goal.
Existing law provides that the California Workforce Investment
Board (CWIB) is responsible for assisting the Governor in, among
other things, the development, oversight, and continuous improvement
of California's workforce investment system. Existing law requires
the board, in collaboration with specified state and local partners,
and the local workforce investment boards to develop a specified
strategic workforce plan, updated at least every 5 years, to address
the state's economic, demographic, and workplace needs, and to meet
the single state plan requirement of the Workforce Investment Act of
1998. In that regard, the board aligns and leverages state and local
Workforce Investment Act funding streams, identifies specified
industry sectors and clusters, provides skills-gap analysis, and
establishes specified eligibility criteria for the Workforce
Investment Act eligible training provider list.
This bill would require the CWIB to establish the San Joaquin
Valley Regional Economic Planning and Preparedness Council as a
special committee, composed of specified members, to, among other
things, identify and develop the framework of, and make
recommendations as to, appropriate strategies, programs, policies,
partnerships, and funding opportunities that are necessary to address
the growing need for a highly skilled and well-trained workforce to
meet the needs of the San Joaquin Valley's emerging technology and
energy economy. The bill would require the council to report to the
Legislature, by April 1 each year, on the status of its activities
and its development of an oil and natural gas workforce strategic
initiative.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Division 11 (commencing with Section 19000) is added to
the Unemployment Insurance Code, to read:
DIVISION 11. San Joaquin Valley Regional Economic Planning and
Preparedness Act of 2014
19000. This division shall be known, and may be cited, as the San
Joaquin Valley Regional Economic Planning and Preparedness Act of
2014.
19001. The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:
(a) The San Joaquin Valley composed of the Counties of Fresno,
Kern, Kings, Madera, Merced, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, and Tulare is
home to an estimated 4 million Californians.
(b) For the last two decades, the San Joaquin Valley Region has
maintained average annual unemployment rates ranging from 62 percent
to 150 percent above the state average.
(c) The San Joaquin Valley's per capita income is $31,533 and 50
percent of the San Joaquin Valley's population is in poverty
including thousands of unemployed and underemployed people.
(d) The San Joaquin Valley continues to face significant economic
challenges including, poverty, unemployment, and an inadequately
trained workforce.
(e) The San Joaquin Valley is also home to hard-working
immigrants, new entrepreneurs, business and labor leaders, learning
institutions including the new University of California, Merced,
cities and towns renewing themselves, and community and nonprofit
agencies uniting to develop civic leadership.
(f) Developing the San Joaquin Valley's workforce skills and
aligning public and private workforce development resources with
industry growth opportunities in the region to meet current and
future business workforce requirements and close the
business-workforce skills gap will cultivate higher paying jobs and
will allow its economy to flourish.
19002. (a) (1) The California Workforce Investment Board (CWIB)
shall establish a special committee known as the San Joaquin Valley
Regional Economic Planning and Preparedness Council (SJVREPPC) to
develop an oil and natural gas workforce strategic initiative to
address the growing need for a highly skilled and well-trained
workforce to meet the needs of the expanding energy economy of the
San Joaquin Valley.
(2) Membership of the SJVREPPC shall include appropriate
representatives from the CWIB existing membership, including a K-12
education representative, a California Community Colleges
representative, an Employment Development Department representative,
a Department of Food and Agriculture representative, a Governor's
Office of Business and Economic Development representative, a
California Transportation Commission representative, a local
workforce investment board representative, and other appropriate
members.
(3) The CWIB may call on other state agencies, other higher
education representatives, and industry representatives as well as
philanthropic and nongovernmental groups as appropriate and necessary
to serve as consultants to the SJVREPPC in the development of this
strategic initiative.
(b) In developing the strategic initiative, the SJVREPPC shall do
all of the following:
(1) Identify and develop the framework of, and make
recommendations as to, appropriate strategies, programs, policies,
partnerships, and funding opportunities that are necessary to address
the growing need for a highly skilled and well-trained workforce to
meet the needs of the San Joaquin Valley's emerging technology and
energy economy. The SJVREPPC shall, when examining the energy
industry in the San Joaquin Valley, consider the business and
workforce needs of the entire energy industry cluster.
(2) Identify resources and facilitate linkages between federal and
state agencies and the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium,
the Central California Workforce Collaborative, local workforce
investment boards, and individual career technology programs, high
schools, and higher education institutions on issues related to
education, training, and workforce development in support of the
region's expanding energy industry sector.
(3) Facilitate the development of public, private, philanthropic,
and nongovernmental partnerships to build and expand the state's
workforce development programs, network, and infrastructure related
to the energy sector.
(4) Provide policy guidance for job training programs in the
expanding energy sector to assist and prepare specific populations in
the San Joaquin Valley, such as at-risk youth, displaced workers,
veterans, formerly incarcerated individuals, and others facing
barriers to employment.
(5) Develop, collect, interpret, and distribute statewide and
regional labor market data on California's current and expanding
workforce needs, trends, and job growth within the oil and gas
industry.
(6) Identify funding resources and make recommendations on how to
expand and leverage these funds.
(7) Foster additional regional collaboration within the San
Joaquin Valley related to the emerging petroleum technology and
energy economic sector.
19003. On or before April 1, 2015, and each April 1 thereafter,
the CWIB shall report to the Legislature on the status of SJVREPPC
activities and its development of an oil and natural gas workforce
strategic initiative. The report shall be submitted in compliance
with Section 9795 of the Government Code.