The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act: The Role of Workforce Programs

10 Challenges and Accomplishments

309 10 Challenges and Accomplishments States’ Views John Trutko Capital Research Corporation Burt S. Barnow George Washington University This chapter summarizes the visited states’ views on the most significant challenges and greatest achievements in implementing the Recovery Act workforce and UI provisions. During the two rounds of site visits (workforce development programs) and the teleconference interviews (UI programs), UI and state and local workforce agency officials were asked their views on their greatest overall challenges and accomplishments in dealing with the Recovery Act, as well as challenges and achievements for specific programs. The previous chapters summarized challenges and accomplishments for specific programs or provisions, and this chapter describes the challenges and accomplishments most frequently noted by states visited. CHALLENGES AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS—WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT PROVISIONS Challenges An important objective of the site visits involved identifying challenges that states and local workforce areas encountered in planning and implementing Recovery Act requirements. During two rounds of site visits, states and local workforce areas were asked to identify 310 Trutko and Barnow and discuss their greatest challenges and major accomplishments with respect to the Recovery Act. The most commonly cited challenges are listed in Table 10.1. The most commonly cited challenge, mentioned by 17 of the 20 states visited, was dealing with the RecoveryAct reporting requirements. Many of the comments by state workforce agencies focused on the need to set up, with little notice, new reports that were different from their regular reports in terms of schedule and, in some instances, content. The frequency of reporting—monthly rather than quarterly—also was viewed by some states as burdensome. One state official indicated that reporting on jobs “saved” or “created” was challenging because it was difficult to know which jobs really fit into that category. Several state officials commented that they did not have enough time to complete the software programming to generate required reports; some of the initial definitions of data items were unclear to some states (Illinois and Montana); and, at least in the case of TAA, a few states believed that ETA did not issue guidance sufficiently in advance of when the reports were due (Colorado, Michigan, and Ohio). Several of the specific concerns identified by states with regard to reporting are illustrated below: • Colorado. Reporting on Recovery Act expenditures has proved to be burdensome for the state. The state workforce agency had to scramble to set up a separate set of financial reports to meet Recovery Act requirements. This was because the timing for Recovery Act reporting was not the same as for reporting on other expenditures. The fiscal period for the state workforce agency cuts off 10 days after the end of the quarter. However, for Recovery Act fiscal reporting, the state had to develop an expenditure report for Recovery Act funds as of the last day of the month at quarter’s end. This meant that the timing for producing the Recovery Act fiscal reports did not match with the timing of what the state normally uses for its regular reporting on other programs , such as the WIA programs. There also was not enough time to validate the data used to meet Recovery Act reporting requirements, as is normally the case with the regular reporting system. In addition, it was burdensome for the state to report on Recovery Act expenditures by county and congressional district. The state had to move very quickly with existing IT staff to meet the Recovery Act reporting requirements. This effort was fur- Challenges and Accomplishments: States’ Views 311 ther complicated because guidance from the ETA on reporting requirements came very late. For example, guidance on financial reporting was issued in mid-September(of 2009), and the report was due to the USDOL about two weeks later (September 30). • Michigan. One of the larger and more burdensome aspects of TAA reauthorization was the new reporting requirements. The USDOL issued final guidance on reporting only a few weeks before reports were due, which made it difficult for states to meet the new requirements. One of the most burdensome reporting elements was the need to report accrued expenditures on training per participant per quarter—this necessitated the entry of accrued and actual expenditures for each TAA participant into the system each quarter. • Nevada. Reporting was a nightmare. More state participation in the development of reporting requirements would have been useful. States could have provided information on current data collection and systems in place to...