March 2008

SOUTHERN ARIZONA AWARDED $2 MILLION GRANT

Grant Summary

Technical Proposal

Cost Proposal

June 2007

SOUTHERN ARIZONA AWARDED $5 MILLION
WIRED GRANT FROM LABOR DEPARTMENT
 

Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao today named southern Arizona as one of 13 regions selected by the U.S. Department of Labor to receive $5 million over a three-year period for a WIRED initiative (Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development).  Governor Napolitano submitted the proposal for Innovation Frontier Arizona on behalf of Pima, Cochise, S. Cruz and Yuma Counties.

 

WIRED grants are intended to serve as seed money to spur the transformation of regional economies into places where talent drives prosperity. The department launched WIRED in late 2005 with a competition among the nation’s governors. In February 2006, 13 regions were awarded in the first round with an additional 13 regions receiving WIRED planning grants. In January 2007, these “virtual” WIRED sites were presented awards to implement their regional plans. Today’s announcement launches the third generation of selected regions.

 

The strategy for Innovation Frontier Arizona is to develop talent for the high-value, high-wage jobs in the aerospace-defense and information technology clusters. These jobs share a common core of competencies required for several other industries in the region with strong growth potential, including the bio-economy.  At the same time, the defense industry can be seen within the larger framework of homeland security, where it has synergies with the increasingly technological nature of border management. 21st Century skills are needed in a range of professional service jobs throughout the region to meet the challenges and opportunities presented through the national effort to assure a secure, safe and efficient border.

 

Innovation Frontier Arizona promotes career ladder development and system alignment around engineering technology, information technology, and entrepreneurship.  The region’s community colleges, universities, businesses, and other stakeholders will develop core education and training curriculum that will allow greater regional access to best-in-class resources, creating efficiencies of scale allowing development of specialty programs that meet defined industry needs.  Engaging the K-12 system and helping educators develop new approaches and skill sets for contextual learning in math, science and business-concept development will ensure a continuous pipeline of essential talent. Scaling best-practice initiatives around entrepreneurship will energize high-tech and other small business activity throughout the region, promoting additional opportunity and wage growth.  Meanwhile, infusing 21st digital literacy skills in key service-sectors that support the border and other target clusters will ensure the safe, smooth and legal flow of goods and people as well as support movement up the high-technology ladder.  A regional knowledge transfer system will help scale and sustain initiatives; facilitate continual, shared learning; and create opportunity across the region.

 

The Innovation Frontier partnership includes the following stakeholders:

Workforce investment system:  Governor’s Workforce Policy Council, the Workforce Investment Boards of Pima, Santa Cruz, Cochise, and Yuma Counties, Pima County One Stop, Cochise County Workforce Development, Inc., Santa Cruz One Stop, Yuma Private Industry Council, Inc.

Universities:  University of Arizona (McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship, External Relations and Out-reach, and Economic Development/Southwest Border Security Consortium); University of Arizona—South; Arizona State University Polytechnic; Northern Arizona University-Yuma.

Community Colleges: Arizona Western College (Yuma County); Cochise Community College, which also serves Santa Cruz County; Pima Community College

K-12 education system: Tucson Unified School District, Sierra Vista Public Schools (Cochise), Santa Cruz Public Schools; Yuma County Schools; Governor’s P-20 Council; Arizona Department of Education; Project Lead The Way

Business: Aerospace Manufacturing and Information Technology (AMIT)—an industry as-sociation; Joint Alliance of Companies for Managing Education for Technology; numerous employers (Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics Signal Solutions, EC III, ManTec, NGC and TES)

Economic development: Arizona Department of Commerce, Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities (TREO); Sierra Vista Economic Development Foundation; Greater Yuma Economic Development Corporation, Greater Nogales Port Authority

Government: State of Arizona: Cochise, Pima, Santa Cruz and Yuma Counties; Department of Homeland Security; Department of Defense

Other: IdeaXchange, IDEA Funding, Arizona Science Foundation

 

The Governor’s Office is the grant recipient for Innovation Frontier Arizona, with Pima County designated as the project lead. Pima County will work closely with its workforce system counterparts in Yuma, Santa Cruz and Cochise Counties to convene partners and coordinate efforts under Innovation Frontier Arizona.  Pima County also will serve as fiscal agent of the overall initiative.

October 2006

Federal Legislative Update

Congressional Schedule

Congress recessed in the early hours of Saturday, September 30, 2006 to return to their districts. All Representatives and one in three Senators are up for reelection and will be spending the recess campaigning. House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-OH) wants the House to return on November 13 for a week of work and then take off Thanksgiving week and the following week before returning December 4.

 Appropriations Continuing Resolution

Before recessing for midterm elections, Congress had finished work on only two of the year’s spending bills: Defense and Homeland Security. The government’s fiscal year began October 1, and in order to continue funding the majority of the federal government not included in the two passed spending bills, Congress passed a continuing resolution (CR) on September 29.

The CR sets funds for non-Defense/Homeland Security programs through November 17, 2006. The funding level for this period will be at the lowest of the House-passed, Senate-passed, or FY 2006 levels. With little work time left in the lame duck period after the midterm elections, it is unlikely that Congress will be able to pass its other spending bills. In such a case, legislators will most likely include all unadopted appropriations bills in an omnibus bill, which Members would pass before adjourning at the end of the year.

 Reauthorizations Update

       Congress has been unable to reauthorize the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) due to a religious hiring provision included in the House bill. It remains unlikely that legislators will be able to break their impasse over this issue before they adjourn this year. If this is the case, the new Congress will take up WIA reauthorization next year.

        Congress extended the Higher Education Act (HEA) reauthorization to June 30, 2007. In March, the House voted to extend HEA for another five years, but the bill stalled in the Senate. The new Congress will take up work on a longer term HEA reauthorization next year.

Federal Youth Coordination Act

On September 30, amid the flurry of activity before recessing for midterm elections, Congress passed the Federal Youth Coordination Act (FYCA) and renamed it the Tom Osborne Federal Youth Coordination Act (H.R.856/S.409). Representative Tom Osborne (R-NE) and Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN) introduced the bill in February 2005.

In response to a December 2003 report by the White House Task Force for Disadvantaged Youth, FYCA’s sponsors drafted the bipartisan legislation in partnership with National Collaboration for Youth (NCY) and its member organizations. The Task Force found that programs seeking to meet the needs of young people are spread across 12 federal departments with little communication or coordination among them. FYCA establishes a Federal Youth Development Council that will enable the federal government to implement multifaceted approaches to reaching youth by leveraging and coordinating the existing resources of different federal agencies. FYCA is now at the White House for the president’s signature.

For information on FYCA from the National Collaborative for Youth, visit - www.youthcoordinationact.org.

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