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Home My WebLink About11-04-2010-Doc15842-1` SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING November 4, 2010 The Council Meeting of the Council of the County of Kauai was called to order by the Council Chair at the Council Chambers, 3371-A Wilcox Road, Lihu`e, Kauai, on Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 9:11 a.m., after which the following members answered the call of the roll: Honorable Tim Bynum Honorable Dickie Chang Honorable Jay Furfaro Honorable Daryl W. Kaneshiro Honorable Lani T. Kawahara Honorable Derek S.K. Kawakami Honorable Bill "Kaipo" Asing, Council Chair Chair Asing: Can we have the first item please? Mr. Nakamura: First item is approval of the agenda. APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Mr. Kaneshiro moved for approval of the agenda as circulated, seconded by Mr. Chang, and unanimously carried. Chair Asing: Next item please. Mr. Nakamura: Next matter is approval of the following communication, Communication C 2010-296. COMMUNICATION: C 2010-296 Communication (10/27/2010) from the Workforce Investment Act Administrator, requesting Council approval of the following: 1. to apply for, receive, and expend funds from the State Energy Sector Partnership Grant (SESP) under the authority of the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) for "Energy Sector Strategy Training" designed to support Hawai`i's Clean Energy Initiative in the amount of $273,278.00. 2. indemnification clause contained in the State contract. Chair Asing: Thank you. Before we make a motion to approve, I'd like to have Glenn Sato up please. There being no objections, the rules were suspended. GLENN SATO, ENERGY EXTENSION SERVICE: Good morning, Glenn Sato, Office of Economic .Development. Filling in for my boss George Costa who's on vacation. This is basically ARRA funding and it's you know worker training funds to train workers in emerging or expanding energy related industries. It's part of a six million dollar funding that came to the State Department of Labor Work Force Development Council and Kaua`i's share that we're requesting is $273,278.00. I have Jan Miyamoto from our office and also Jonathan Chun from the Kauai Workforce Investment Board behind me if there are any specific questions. ., • SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING • - 2 - September 8, 2010 Chair Asing: Thank you. With that, Councilmember Furfaro. Mr. Furfaro: Good morning. Thank you for being here. First of all our many thanks for the previous and current applications that the office has applied for but I just wanted to reconfirm that this $273,278.00, there is a formula that is tied to the current unemployment rate that determines what we can apply for? Mr. Sato: Well this amount was determined by a lot of meetings with industry partners in trying to figure out what types of training programs that were required and... Jan can provide some more detail but from my understanding is that the figure was developed with the training aspects in mind. Mr. Furfaro: I do understand that we do target the need to improve the capacities in certain industries and so on but then it is subject to a formula and I would like to get some clarity if Jan could help with that, so we know how we came up to... please stay right up there with her... maybe just pull up another chair, how's that? And Jan thank you for being here this morning. JAN MIYAMOTO, WIA SPECIALIST IV: Good morning. Jan Miyamoto, Office of Economic Development, WIA Administrator. Thank you for the opportunity. Yes to clarify, this was a grant that the State Workforce Development Council applied for and was awarded the maximum six million dollars. As far as the allocation to the counties, unlike the normal formula funds for WIA, this one was not done on a formula basis. Instead each county collaborated with a group of industry representatives to identify what would be key opportunities to develop or support training and basically because of time limitations, it was looking at those kinds of programs that could be implemented within the timeframe that we are operating under. Each county then put together a listing of their priorities in terms of the types of training that we felt would be most relevant to our community and that we could implement into that short period of time. Each county then submitted it to the Workforce Development Council Steering Committee and they reviewed it and the total dollar amounts clearly exceeded amount that was allocated to the local Workforce Investment Boards. So on the basis of the total dollars that were requested, it was then allocated out on a prorata basis, based on those request that were made. Mr. Furfaro: Well I wanted to make sure we got that clarified because the typical money we get is based on the unemployment index but what I'm hearing from you... this money was solely awarded to us based on a training business plan that you folks actually submitted with the kokua assistance of industry leaders on the island. Ms. Miyamoto: That's correct. Mr. Furfaro: This is solely based on the business plan you submitted for training needs on the island and you're to be congratulated. Ms. Miyamoto: Thank you and I appreciate that. And let me just clarify... of the six million... 2.84 million was allocated towards local webs and so actually the allocation that the County of Kauai got of that 2.84 million was 9.6%, so clearly much greater than what we would typically get on a formula basis type of program. r~ • • SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING - 3 - September 8, 2010 Mr. Furfaro: Thank you again. I wanted to clarify that and thank you folks very much for your commitment to get this extra money into the workforce development pool for training. Thank you Mr. Chair. Chair Asing: Thank you. Any other questions? Councilmember Kawahara. Ms. Kawahara: Thank you. Thank you Chair Asing. Thank you for being here this morning and again thank you for going out and identifying money and grants for the programs. I see that there's... it's supposed to help for recruiting and placing into employment thirty-nine (39) program participants especially, so it's going to be a measurable factor actually. Where do you expect to be finding the target people? Ms. Miyamoto: The target for these funds are dislocated workers. It would be working through our one stop office, the Workwise One-Stop Office in terms of identifying those who qualify. For most of these training programs there are prerequisite kinds of background and skills that already need to... that participants need to possess to qualify for the additional training, so they will be working in identifying those individuals. Ms. Kawahara: And you don't expect to have any problems with finding thirty-nine (39) or shouldn't be any problem at all. Ms. Miyamoto: That should not be a problem. Ms. Kawahara: Okay. And then I notice how you folks spread it out starting with the first part of the year, you got it at five thousand, forty thousand, seventy thousand, seventy-five and one ten and so you're starting at a lower level and not a higher level to kick it off and then going up higher. Ms. Miyamoto: Well actually... the original budget and this was submitted some time ago, so the projection was that we would actually have gone through this process and have the funds available from September, so already this point in time that has clearly elapsed. The likelihood is the implementation or execution of the contract won't be, till December or the first quarter of 2011. In essence the money will be consolidated further, so it was projected out to be for a greater period of time. Ms. Kawahara: Okay. Ms. Miyamoto: And that was just basically for the logistics of the screening process and so forth but once the candidates are identified then the money would be more actively expended as tuition is being paid... Ms. Kawahara: Okay. Ms. Miyamoto: For participants. Ms. Kawahara: Great, thank you. Chair Asing: Any further questions? If not, thank you very much Glenn and Jan. I'd like to call the meeting back to order. There being no one else to speak on this matter, the meeting was called back to order, and proceeded as follows: ~. SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING Chaix Asing: - 4 - September 8; 2010 Can we have a motion to approve? Mr. Chang moved to approve C 2010-296, seconded by Ms. Kawahara, and unanimously carried. ADJOURNMENT. There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 9:23 a.m. ectfully submitted, J PETER A. NAKAMURA County Clerk /ds