AUGUSTA, Maine — After Gov. Paul LePage criticized the state’s workforce-training boards for spending only 20 percent of their funds on actual job training, a new strategic plan calls for a single statewide board to set policy and oversee program finances.
The plan, which would eliminate the state’s four current regional workforce boards in favor of the statewide panel, also charges local and regional chambers of commerce with regularly calling together businesses in their areas to hear from them about what they need from workers.
The regional boards’ current operators are concerned that a single board charged with setting statewide policy will overlook each region’s unique workforce and business needs. But labor officials in the LePage administration say their plan will lead to more input from businesses so job training programs can respond to industry demand.
Gov. LePage appointed the State Workforce Investment Board last December after learning that, in recent years, about 20 percent of federal job training funds for Maine was spent on actual job training while much of the remainder was spent on administration. He said a single, statewide board would offer closer oversight of the spending of those federal workforce dollars.
But the local boards the statewide panel will replace say they’ve been making progress in recent years reducing the amount they spend on overhead, improving job placement rates for trainees and closely involving businesses in their decision making.
“We are all in agreement that we need to be constantly improving,” said Joanna Russell, executive director of the Tri-County Workforce Investment Board, which serves Hancock, Penobscot and Piscataquis counties. “It would not be beneficial for any of the local boards to pour cement on any policy or any practice that we implement. We need to be ready to constantly move with the changes that occur.”
The existing, regional boards are better suited to carry out improvements that work for their respective areas, Russell said.
“If you’re going to create training systems and policy in northern Maine, it cannot be identical as you would create policy for southern Maine,” she said. “Portland and Presque Isle are completely different.”
The officials from the State Workforce Investment Board and the Department of Labor who have crafted the new strategic plan say its reforms will result in more local input and help job training programs better respond to the needs in their immediate areas.
Instead of the four regional workforce investment boards, the plan tasks chambers of commerce in eight Maine regions with regularly convening businesses — both chamber members and nonchamber members — so they can discuss, among other topics, the skills on which job training programs should focus. The chambers of commerce would then inform the statewide workforce board about those conversations.
“By having eight smaller areas, they will be easier to access. They will be closer to home,” said Garret Oswald, State Workforce Investment Board director. “The conversations there will be much more locally nuanced.”
“We wanted to reach out to more people, to more employers,” said Fred Webber, who chairs the State Workforce Investment Board. “We thought, ‘doesn’t it make sense to go from four to eight regions around the state?’”
The eight Maine regions will align with the eight regions the state uses to market itself to tourists.
The four regions for local workforce investment boards were formed in 1998 under the federal Workforce Investment Act.
In the south, the region stretches from York County to Waldo County. The northernmost region serves Aroostook and Washington counties, and the western region serves Androscoggin, Franklin, Kennebec, Oxford and Somerset counties. In the Bangor area, the workforce board serves Penobscot, Piscataquis and Hancock counties.
Those regional boards generally contract with providers in their area to provide job training. In the Bangor region, the Tri-County board contracts with the Eastern Maine Development Corp.
Chambers of commerce are a natural fit for gathering businesses and collecting information about their needs, said Dana Connors, president of the Maine State Chamber of Commerce. Local chambers will reach out to members and nonmembers when planning workforce investment meetings, he said.
“They represent the business community, and they’ll be asked to convene the business community,” he said. “The role that has evolved for local and regional chambers is really one that is very compatible to their mission.”
The State Workforce Investment Board includes representatives from businesses, the state Legislature, higher education, labor unions and other organizations.
Before the board can officially take on the responsibility of overseeing Maine’s workforce training programs, the LePage administration needs special permission from the U.S. Department of Labor, since federal law currently assigns that responsibility in Maine to the four regional workforce boards.
The strategic plan includes that waiver request. The workforce investment board is accepting public comments on the plan through Sept. 2 and expects to submit it to the federal government by Sept. 15.
Comments can be sent to SWIB.dol@maine.gov.
80% of funds used for administration?
Sounds like everything else the government tries to run and why the government should stay out of it and stop wasting our money.
funny, Its actually Private Non-profits that are running the show. The Government just sets the money aside, then they have the non profits get the money.
It is a Government program and they set it up run the way it runs. The failure is theirs because the method in which money is distributed is theirs.
No, That is wrong. How the funds are used are up to the private companies. They are the ones spending 80% on admin. Not the government.
The government set up the system that gives this money to waste to the private companies without proper oversight. That is poor planning and a bad system set up by the government. Simple government failure.
Why do you feel the need to defend their failure in creating this flawed system?
because you just describe every bad investment by ever company ever. You seem to think that what you described is sole the problem on the government. You are simply trying to bash the government, which out thinking. Also I am not surprised that it is only 20%. These programs are very labor intensive to begin with with a lot of moving parts trying to get things organized. This type of stuff just doesn’t happen naturally. You need people to get stuff going, to get things organized, to meet with potential participants. Accountants to make sure the reporting and the drawing of money is correct and people are getting paid. Check in with Participants and vendor alike.
You don’t need people to do any gathering and parceling with the money if you don’t throw it to the winds to begin with.
Well, not exactly “everything else” — Medicare has a 3-4% administrative cost and is well administered, as long as Congress keeps its sticky fingers out of the operation!
Absolute power corrupts absolutely–
The more LePage consolidates, the more absolute he becomes. And he seems to like being mean, often for no particular purpose.
So you believe 80% of the money going to administration is just dandy? Why would anyone want to change that? Just to be mean I suppose. Find something to bash about that uses a little common sense!
I would guess 80% or better of this work is done by administrators as they are social workers assisting persons to find employment. The work done by job seekers is free after all should we just give the money to businesses or the unemployed. GOP=Business Welfare
Maybe government should just get out of it completely and not give any money to anyone. When will you liberals learn that you can’t fix things by throwing our money at it. Look how well your war on poverty has worked out. How many trillions have you wasted and how many more poor exist simply because you made them more comfortable being poor and dependant on your freebies.
There are far, far less poor people now than there was before the 60’s era War on Poverty. Those programs cut the number of poor people in 1/2, where it has roughly stayed ever since. So…..what was your point?
Funny you should mention the 60’s. That is when the government changed how they measure what poor means. You don’t think they might have done that to show improvement where there was none do you?
Really, did they change the definition of malnutrition rates, average expected life-span, infant mortality rates and illiteracy rates as well? Because those are the measures that I am talking about.
So in short, no. Not even a little bit.
So in short you’re saying you know nothing about how poverty is measured and you would like to change the subject.
The government is not the answer, we are. The government was not created to be the answer, we were.
Stop sending your money to Washington and expecting it to come back and pay your bills for you. There are laws against these kinds of pyramid schemes and those laws exist because these schemes are rip offs.
Why do you believe they are anymore reliable when run by crooks in Washington?
Wow, talk about changing the subject. “The government is not the answer, we are” is such an empty, meaningless B.S answer. In a democracy, we are the government, that’s the whole point. You dont like the government, it’s “our” fault in the end.
The measurements I pointed out are examples of how poverty affects people in the real world. Would seem to be more meaninful than the movable target you were complaining about.
And the government does not pay my bills, but it does feed and educate children who need it. Food and education that they did not get before government stepped in to provide it. Seriously, we tried it your way…it’s called all of human history before the mid-twentieth century. Does not work well.
Actually history worked exactly as it does now. We had beggers in the streets and homeless then, and after all of the money we have throw around we have it now and I’m not seeing a lot of hope and change out there even after some chose it as there mantra.
Let’s take your example of feeding the children if you really want to limit the topic a bit more.
We give food stamp money to the parents, that didn’t feed the children enough. So we give lunch money to the schools but we still found they weren’t getting breakfast. So we give free breakfast and lunch but still we find children of the poor going hungry and we start stuffing their backpacks with food for the weekends and summers because their parents are still not using the money we gave them to feed them.
Where does cycle this end?
You should try reading a Dickens novel (or any economic history textbook). You are just wrong. The worldview you have created for yourself has no attachment to any historical arc whatsoever. Are there beggers and homeless, sure. Are there nearly as many as there used to be? Not even close. Not even close. a 3rd time….Not even close….unless you have your way, that is.
And if you want to let kids stay malnurished, that’s cool. That’s a you problem. I prefer that it does not happen.
Thank you for your patient and informative posts. I learned from every one of them–and I’m sure I will if you end up posting more…
You want to use Dicken’s as your historical referance?
Wow, nothing like getting factual with comparative figures here. If I had known we were going to use fiction to base our judgements I could have just quoted one of Dad’s stories about “the good old days”.
Kids are staying malnourished because you are not addressing the problems by throwing money at it. My mother went out and got government cheese and big cans of government chicken to feed us which she supplemented by digging dandelion greens and potatoes and onions and other staples which were easy to come by depending on the season. Local charity is the key not throwing money at parents who put their other priorities ahead of their children no matter how much money you throw at them.
Food stamps worked because you could see who was using them and how they were used. Now you just put cash in debit cards for them so they can withdraw and use for gambling or drugs instead of food for their kids.
You are not helping this way!
Go with the economic textbook that I mentioned then. Did you not read that part? Reading to fast? I mentioned Dickens because he walked the streets of London and wrote what he saw (and what you want to go back to). Sorry if that’s to highbrow for you. And your solutions of local charity and apprenticeship programs sound like your great-great grandfathers stories about the good old days (they were not that good, FYI).
The “throwing money at the problem “, line is another overused, meaningless canard that ignores reality. Your car breaks down; you throw money at the problem. Pothole caused it? You throw other peoples money at the problem. Need a new worker for your business; you throw money at the problem. “Throwing money” at problems is how we solve most of them. It’s a dumb line, and it makes people sound like they are being dense on purpose.
I will grant you that benefits should not able to be used on frivolous things. There is a solution to that problem that can be found without going back to the nineteenth century.
Can you speak without insulting others or is there some sort of mental problem you’re trying to deal with?
Sometimes we use lines like “throwing money at the problem” because they apply, and sometimes we have to use them more often than we would like because they apply too often. If my car breaks down I do not just throw money at the mechanic and tell him to spend whatever it takes on my car. If my roads need repair I should not just throw money at the State and tell them I don’t care how much of my money it takes to make a road.
If our people need training we should not just throw money at some not for profit (that doesn’t mean the people running it won’t make a ton of money in salaries by the way) and tell them we don’t care how little of it goes to accomplish the task.
Solutions can be found if people look for them, and that means changing the very poor way we are managing our resources now.
Oh whaaaa. I found your bold historical statements with no connection to fact whatsoever to be intellectually insulting. You are talking about cutting off funding for hungry children….so sorry if my “mental problem” hurt your fragile feelings.
I didn’t say my feelings were hurt, I just asked if it was possible for you to maintain a civil tone. Apparently it is not so I see no reason to remain civil either.
As for what I am talking about it is not about taking food out of children’s mouths it is about not wasting our money on their parents booze and drug habits but actually making sure we feed the children.
The money you want real tax payers like me to throw out to parents so that you can sell them your body or your pills does little or nothing to feed children. If it did we would not also have to feed them all their meals in schools and send them home with backpacks filled with food.
You can find a lot of governments just like the one you described that offer no assistance, no education and no medical help, etc… Thankfully not here in the USA! We provide aid to many of these third world countries – medical, educational, providing food, clothing and shelter.
I don’t consider it a brilliant plan to try to turn our country into a like-kind poverty stricken, uneducated place. It’s a really bad idea to put our people in poverty while we fund third world countries in strengthening their people and their countries.
This is not about freebies… it’s about investing in your OWN COUNTRY’S PEOPLE. Particularly when it comes to education it pays back in the long run. For example, how many students could afford the high cost of college if not for grants and other financial aid programs? You really think it’s better not to educate? Well, I disagree. I want to live in a progressive country, not a third world country where millions live in absolute poverty without hope. If you want to live like that… please go to countries that don’t invest in their people
OH please, save the BS for someone who will believe it. Our country was quite prosperous long before we turned ourselves into the welfare state we are now.
We need to eliminate the waste in our programs, that’s not exactly the road to 3rd worldism. Continuing to spend twice what you make every minute of every day is and that is a fact!
Oh please… you’ve got to more than naive to think you’re going to eliminate waste by ending aid to the needy. The waste that you speak of is not at the bottom… it’s at the top.
Are you even aware that we pay members of Congress and the Senate far more than they are worth? Do you know that we give them pensions that they haven’t earned? These aren’t jobs, they are elected officials who were never intended to profit from their representation. Add to that that these people have not worked long enough to be vested in a pension… that’s just a wasteful perk. They give themselves “special” healthcare plans that cost far more. They exempt themselves from the laws we have to abide by. And guess what… it may surprise you to know that both Republicans and Democrats cooperate when they vote on their own wage increases.
BOTH PARTIES want you to think it’s better to end aid to the needy than it is for them to have to sacrifice something like possibly covering themselves with the same healthcare plan as all other government employees. Or maybe ending the practice of gifting themselves with unearned pensions and unearned lifetime healthcare. It’s just foolish to think the needy are causing the problem.
Do you really think the needy are up there controlling Congress and the Senate? Guess again… they aren’t there. And, if you think any politician – Republican or Democrat – is putting the needy before their own wants and desires you are far more naive than I even thought.
The waste is at the top. They’ve created the debt by taking care of themselves FIRST and not by being too generous. They aren’t showing one iota of willingness to give up anything which they would be doing if they were such kind and generous folks who are so badly taken advantage of by poor and needy people. But, if they can convince people like you to believe the poor and the needy are the problem… you won’t notice that they’re still getting raises and perks. It’s works well doesn’t it?
When lowly government employees were getting axe and their wages and benefits cut back severely, members of Congress and the Senate were voting themselves raises. THAT is where the real waste is. But some things were never on the table for cuts or even discussion. All politicians – Republicans and Democrats – did agree on one thing… that their wage increases were a vital expense during a recession.
It’s the same thing in the corporate world. Big businesses are turning better profits than ever before but they are doing it by making our country poor. They are paying foreign workers to do the work our people need. Yes, they save THEMSELVES a lot of money but they aren’t investing it into the USA – they are investing in foreign countries via wages. Corporate giants are not innocent in all this… they are making the USA weaker and weaker and poorer and poorer.
No, I’m not inclined to blame the needy for this mess… I blame those who had a voice in the process – Members of Congress and the Senate and corporate leaders. They aren’t wearing halos and I’m no where near as gullible as you to believe that the kind politicians have been so selfless that they gave too much to the needy and it created a huge debt. Now THAT is just BS. I hold our elected representatives and the corporate leaders who “bought them” a seat totally responsible for this mess.
Too much of a rant there to read it all but I think I caught your jist from the first few lines. At no time did we talk about how I felt about all government waste. We were discussing the waste in our social programs. I am against all of the waste you were ranting about as well. I want all taxes and exemptions gone and in there place one tax for all. No government paybakcs and no more government deals. I want members of congress elected and paid for by their States at the rate each state chooses with all retirement and benefits at the discretion of the State. I want them to answer to us as they used to.
Aww come on now… if you can read a whole newspaper article you can read my whole rant. :-) You’re right I get pretty passionate about government waste but I do believe our government is getting away with passing the buck to the little guy who really isn’t the problem. Our government officials and corporate leaders have gotten too greedy and if that doesn’t end middle America is in trouble. I’m worried for the future as I’m sure you are too. And to you my spouse would say… Semper Fi
If its portion of the whole population is an indicator of its potential political clout, middle class America is already in trouble – big trouble. Once, not long ago 60% of citizens in these United States comprised the broad middle class. Today, it is closer to half, if that, and shows no signs of reversing the trend. What’s worse for the efforts to make a middle class democratic society is that class’s realization that it is no match for the corporate elites and plutocrats who have no intention of ever giving one ounce of their influence for the common good – not if it means they must surrender or share any of the nation’s wealth they’ve manged to steer in their direction over the past three decades. For the middling classes there seem little they can do other than take out their frustrations on those on the bottom tiers of society . It’s not hard to do, considering the complete haplessness of the latter, plus it seems there’s always a certain sanctimonious glee to go along with it. Actually it might be the possibility that at any time those barely hanging on might wind up in the same boat with those they condemn. Hunter Thompson’s “fear and loathing” are right up front and present in the body politic – not a good thing.
Not true at all. I amagainst cheating on both ends of the scale which is why I want a flat tax with no loopholes or paybacks of any kind for any one.
I agree that the middle class is already in trouble and has been for quite a while. Many of the people who condemn the poor simply don’t realize just how precarious a position we, the middle class, are in. Many of these folks aspire to be perceived as a part of the rich and powerful. That’s a big mistake.
We are allowing politicians to steer us into a divide and conquer mentality. We are allowing politicians to implant the concept that the other political party is a dangerous enemy. That’s what’s really scary. It has created a situation where many of the middle class are actually inadvertently supporting the concept of a
hierarchy instead of a democracy.
I do hope the middle class can find a way of coming together to demand more from all of our elected officials regardless of party. We can’t let them convince us that the each other are the enemy or that the middle class or the poor are the enemy. A united middle class stands a chance a divided one is a pushover. It’s time for the people to come together despite their political preferences and I hope the middle class sees what’s happen right now before it’s too late.
Ooohhhh Rahhhhh!
I will tell you now, I rant against all waste at all levels. I want a simpler tax system and I don’t want congress cheating the works either.
So rant away on your points because they are just as valid when it comes to things we need to fix and saying so and so did it in the past so we must accept it for the future doesn’t cut it for me either.
Where was your spouse stationed?
Camp Pendleton – Now retired veteran
Gotta love Hollywood!
My family stayed all East Coast at Cherry Point for the most part but I was gone all the time. I’ve been out for awhile myself now.
How about that. My husband was born at Cherry Point when his father was in the military. If only everyone could debate like you and I… without hostility. I might not agree with you on everything and thank God for that or we’d be clones! But, I see you as a fellow American and one who I am grateful to for having protected my freedom and I don’t care if you are Democrat or Republican… you are an American!
My son was born in the same Hospital your husband was born in. I do understand that we all have the same good intentions no matter how much our paths to the destination diverge and I don’t mind the passion I see on these sites. People care enough to have an opinion and I much prefer that over those who don’t care about anything but American Idol. My dad is a democrat and a former Navy guy and I don’t hold either against him.
Take care DJ and who knows, we may actually know each other and not even know it. I know a couple guys here in Maine named Brown but I don’t know their service history. Maybe Hubby is one of them.
Pure unadulterated BS. No one is dependent. No one is comfortable being poor. You have absolutely no evidence to the contrary. This is a fantasy in your mind not reality. The war on poverty was very successful nothing was wasted but it was overwhelmed by the failure of unrestrained capitalism and its inherent defects of recession and depression.
Nothing was wasted?
You like having 20% of your dollar actually going to the cause you are forced to give to?
What voluntary donation based non-profit would you donate to with that sort of administration set up?
Reagan did it.
You can’t keep making mistakes over and over just because some past person who did some other things right also made these same mistakes. He granted amnesty to illegals as well and look how well that fixed our illegal immigrant problem. Handouts create more people in need of handouts in the same way each round of amnesty only create more future amnesties.
He granted amesnty to Illegals that are trying to make there lives better, that are trying to help the USA be better. Yes they are Illegal by are here simply to make there lives better. The Amensty helps us both. It keeps motivated individuals who are here to try and do great things in the USA, and it gives them a path to a better life. I can’t for the life of me see how God loving republicans can be against this.
Look at the history of amnesty fo illegals.
First a couple hundrend thousand, then over a million, now what 12 million?
Granting amnesty only opens the floodgates that we call our borders to more invasions by people who will worok less doing our jobs. Doesn’t this sort of undo everything Unions have fought for over the past 70 years or so.
Employers can pay less than minimum wage and abuse people who have no legal standing here. Why would they hire your Union worker?
Why do you assume all Republicans to be religious?
People really seem to respond to certain words such as “administration” without thinking through exactly what that really means. Those words are used intentionally to garner this shocked reaction.
People need to be paid for the work they do so of course the majority of job training funds goes to administration of the program! This money pays the wages for the social workers (who are not overpaid) and job training instructors/counselors. Isn’t it funny how something so simple can be made to sound so bad when in fact it’s just normal operating expenses at normal percentages of how funds are used?
I have to agree with the original poster that absolute power won’t redistribute these funds… but it will corrupt. It always does.
That 80% will still be there. It will just be closer to LePage’s pocket. i don”t think he cares much for the unemployed. He thinks they are lazy.
Spruce you know that I do not particularly like Paul Richard LePage, but in this case I think he is correct. When agencies like Eastern Maine Development only spend 20 percent of the funds allotted for job training on actually training then something has to be done. I believe that LePage hasn’t gone far enough. He should be demanding money back from the agencies that squandered it in my humble opinion. Of course we know that will never happen.
I agree. For a time I sat on one of the boards as an industry representative. Lots of stakeholder representatives ( government, labor, industry) lots of talk, lots of paper and very little to show for it at the end of the day. The Governor is right to try and find a better way.l
20% What a waste of tax dollors
We need job training now. Jobs are going unfilled because they lack the skills.
We need to bring back the simple apprentice programs that used to exist in this country.
I agree with your statement but I’ve seen first hand the waste of these programs. Point in hand. When Loring closed a lot of civilian workers were displaced. They had job retraining seminars and also job training courses. Now this was a good idea but some how it went awry. They spent hours and mega dollars on trying to teach people stuff they couldn’t learn and would never use in a job that they would be eligible for. A school cook, taking an algebra course. Or a custodian taking a physics course. Not that I’m degrading the work these people was doing, its very hard and honest work, but these people was receiving unemployment and was required to take this schooling. I guess what i need to say is that its job security for this 20%, 80% mentality in this line of Federal and State jobs. I think that “ea6bmarine” might have stumbled on to something with the apprentice program idea. We all try to protect what we have and the State Worker that is protecting their job is normal behavior. But is it sound judgement. Its time to look in to all of the cost cutting measures that need addressing soon.
I once participated in a state run job training program in the Baldacci days. My then employer REQUIRED we attend so that the class reached its minimum of 20 ‘students’. The ‘training’ was taught by one part-time private sector person. There were THREE State of Maine administrators & one State of Maine ‘maintenance’ person at the lavishly appointed site in Brunswick. LePage is absolutely on target here. The jobs training program is grossly overloaded with needless, wasteful MSEA SEIU pork. To no surprise, the emphasis was not on training but clearly was an excuse to waste taxpayer dollars.
Job training needs fit the needs of the worker and the potential employer but the worker needs to have the ability to benifit from the training. This needs to be done on one on one if it is going to work well.
It seems that the Great Gov, may have stumbled on to the old State O’ Maine training racket, there will be a number of people loudly calling foul, but, as fair is fair, I try to judge the Great Gov by what he does, this time, from what I have heard and seen, The Great Gov is justified. Reverse welfare is in place, this is probably one of the cases. A lot of people paid a lot of money, and actually doing very little.
Let us know when you see a “Great Gov”.
Keep chopping Mr. Lepage. In the end we will all be better off for it. It seems like most public sector programs are FAT with administrative cost and short on results.
We need to begin On the Job Training in the senior year of high school. President Johnson had program for after school OJT in high school it worked well. Senior’s in high school need to be taking College courses or OJT.
Training? Really?
How about a legislative change to make this impoverished State a RIGHT TO WORK state. Maybe then more companies would consider investing in Maine and its people. Companies are not afraid to train their own people if they think in the end they can sustain their business and be profitable, and the current situation in this state is not to attractive to incoming business.
Yes lets drive wages down, since Maine is considered such a high wage state.
Getaclue? I like any reasonable Mainah would’t support a sweat shop type business moving to Maine because we instituted RIGHT TO WORK LAWS, but quite often lower wages are better than NO wages at all. Currently our best and brightest students are leaving this state in herds because their are not quality jobs in their field and the business climate is dismal. Its just my opinion that right to work laws open doors to new business opportunity for Maine. Less interference from government and organized labor will plant a seed for successful business in Maine. has best working
The reason maine is doing bad is because we are not located near anything. We have a population of 1 million spread are a large area. Maine geographicly is not a very desirable place. Not because we hate businesses.
I know you are right, but i am hopeful that things will improve for our young people. we have a great work force here in Maine and companies would come here start-up businesses here if the regulations were less restrictive.
This State has some of the lowest union activity anywhere. Just what industries do you think would benefit from destroying the union presence?
How is that figure created? I have a hard time believe that 80% is used on Admin.
Why didn’t you read Temperate’s comment above? Someone who’s seen it first hand.
If This governor is in on it you can be sure he gets his cut!
Wages and benefits, job site supervision, training, payroll
taxes and administrative expenses. Its not hard to figure outwhere the 80% of a program would go in administrative cost.
Also any time an advisory meets with a participant that can’t be called training, even tho they are helping out the person. I do not see how the Gov Plan will fix any of that? Yes you might pay less, but you are going to help a lot less people.
Where are the jobs we were promised?
Shipped overseas and tax breaks given to the companies who did exactly that!
So we are going to try and change the entire system when the issue lies in the agencies (emdc and others) who host these LWIBs and are wasting federal dollars on admin costs? Perhaps we need to look closer at these agencies before we throw out the local control that the local workforce investment boards provide us. Seems like we are trying to solve the wrong problem.
Standard issue Republican crying about ‘government waste’. Funny how ‘government waste’ never seems to be an issue when it comes to politicians appointing their friends, benefactors and daughters to government jobs.
So you’re OK with 20% of the funds actually going to job training. I suppose the $1,000,000 that goes for administration of LIHEAP instead of going to buy oil is OK with you too.
I’m certainly not surprised.
Maybe you would like to administer it for free.
How about we “administer” it for the 20% and spend the 80% on actual training!
I have a feeling that isn’t going to happen. That money will go for another Tea Potty project.
You can Admin it for 20% then get nothing done. You will not have anyone want to be a part of the program because no one will get paid.
Do you REALLY think it should cost $1,000,000 to write a few checks??? Keep in mind that the drones who administer this program do not buy, store, or deliver ANY oil. Only in the world were government drones are paid just to show up does this make sense.
why doesn’t he add real savings and cut ALL admin cost in the state government agency’s? Then you might see some savings. But that may leave his family without the BS jobs he gave them
I am not suprised. These types of programs are very labor intesnive. Do people just think that its all automated? You have social workers, and accountants for one. They then you have go out and get people to help the job seekers out. This isn’t something that can just happen. You take away the admin, you help less people. You can spend 50% on it, but it will take you a long time and help fewer people.
I did not vote for PL but his team is correct in attacking this issue – the admin overhead is too high and the number of people that they assist is too low. What you describe, Mr. Mero is more of the same – stalling at best. Either you are misinformed or just poking at PL.
You are going to have high over head, there is a lot of people needed for this to work. Social workers and accountants just to name a couple. You can reduce over head, but you will not help anymore then you are now. You will actually help less, because there is going to be longer turn around times. If vendors are not getting paid timely why would they participate?
I thought I’d never live to see the day, but the Governor is right in this action. Even liberals I know on the workforce board support this initiative. The only caveat is that the money saved had better actually go into job training, not back to the state coffers so recently depleted by unwise tax cuts.
The government getting involved in “job training” is a classic action-reaction response.
For decades now the private sector has moved away from internal training programs and apprenticeships. Companies do not develop talent anymore. Also, employers are now looking for people to fill positions who have to possess such exacting qualifications that complain they cant find anyone.
As this trend has developed over time, the response by local/state/federal government has been to step in and try to provide that function. The classic action-reaction response.
Somebody has to do it. For as long as humans have been operating under a barter or trade system, skills training has been necessary. Nobody is born with the innate knowledge of the specialized skills needed for anything that generates commerce – whether it is agriculture or specialized manufacturing.
Under the umbrella of gnats-ass accounting, training emerged as purely an overhead function, ripe for reduction since it contributes nothing tangible to the bottom line in the short term. As such the lifeblood of successful business – internally groomed talent – is now considered a liability. This is the classic “cut your nose off in spite of your face” scenario.
It stands to reason that as training is pushed out to public sector, its effectiveness is limited. How can a well meaning group of public sector or non-profit individuals possibly replicate the experience of a machine shop, a working farm, myriad health care situations, an engineering firm, or a construction site? All at the same time no less!
So what do you do? Pour more money into the public training system, knowing that you can never match what the employers are screaming for? Or do you cut it off completely, putting many people out of work (who will need training) as well as leaving many average joes with even worse odds of securing employment? Also running the risk of industry driven backlash against the government for pulling the plug. What do you do?
What’s Lepage going after next..Job Corps?
Still waiting for those jobs Paul. When will they be arriving?
How about not hiring a pedofile enabler to run our schools? I bet that would save some money and create jobs in the prison system.
Way to go LaPage! Keep kicking them while they are down.
Fact is, it takes a bit of digging to understand what percentage any organization NEEDS for administration, and what the actual services provided will costs. Blanket statements like these are simply manipulative, intended to inflame the people to gain support.
Take for instance Crisis and social service organizations, such as Crisis Hotlines. They are top heavy on administrative costs because the actual work is done by volunteers. A great example of a world wide organization of this type is American Red Cross Disaster Services. Others would be Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault hotlines. You can count in Homeless shelters and Food Kitchens and others. These organizations need support for their admistrative costs in order to train, organize, advertise, supervise and manage these compicated and valuable services provided at a very low cost. However it does not come free, and it is not invaluable. If you think taking away training for the unempoyed during a financial crisis is how you can put a few more dollars in your pocket, I think you are wrong. That thinking lines up with , “Give the 1%’s more tax cuts and it will trickle down to all of us getting richer.”
Oh, by the way. I have a bridge I can sell you.
The 80% spent on administration is upsetting. A better way to handle this would have been to cap that amount at a lower percentage. If the regional boards can operate and deliver at a lower cost, then eliminate them. But to consolidate this back into Augusta is a gross mistake in judgement by the Lepage Administration. It is simply another move by him and his minions to center power in the Governors office. None of his Commissioners have any authority. All the decisions are made by him and three senior advisers. This is classic Lepage.
unemployment has gone up since Lepage came to power yet he still wants us to build a special highway just to help Canadians steal somemore American jobs.
Thank God for the Governors common sense!
Memories are so disturbingly short… From a Feb. 14, 2012 contributor column by Ted St. Amand also published in the BDN:
“The governor claims that the Workforce Boards spend only 20 percent of their funds for job training with the rest going for administration and overhead. This is false… the governor fails to include the funds for training services that are mandated by law and go to such things as remedial education, resume writing and job search assistance.
“Federal law limits the Workforce Boards to spending only 10 percent of their funds on administrative costs. According to the latest government audits for all contracts approved by the Maine Department of Labor, all of the Workforce Boards are in compliance with this requirement.
“The governor fails to mention that each year before the Workforce Boards even receive their dollars from the federal government, the state withholds up to 25 percent of allocated funds for its own administration and overhead costs…”
The reporter in this current story didn’t say 80% went to administrative costs, but neither did he explain what the 80% went to… so you also need to click on the link in the story “about 20% of federal job training funds.”
Thank you Mr. Governor once again. Please continue the war on government waste. A bunch of govenment fat cats have been wasting our money for far to long.