Legislature(2007 - 2008)BELTZ 211
02/13/2007 01:30 PM Senate LABOR & COMMERCE
| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| Overview: Rural Economic Development | |
| Alaska Workforce Development | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
SENATE LABOR AND COMMERCE STANDING COMMITTEE
February 13, 2007
1:31 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Johnny Ellis, Chair
Senator Gary Stevens, Vice Chair
Senator Bettye Davis
Senator Con Bunde
MEMBERS ABSENT
Senator Lyman Hoffman
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
Overviews: Rural Economic Development and Workforce Development
Issues
PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION
No previous action to consider
WITNESS REGISTER
JULIE KITKA, President
Alaska Federation of Natives
POSITION STATEMENT: Presented rural economic update.
ALICE ROGOFF, Chair
Alaska Native Arts Foundation
Anchorage AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Presented Alaska Native Arts Foundation
update.
KAREY IRWIN BROW, Executive Director
Alaska Native Arts Foundation
POSITION STATEMENT: Presented Alaska Native Arts Foundation
update.
MIKE ANDREWS, Director
Alaska Works Partnership Inc.
Fairbanks AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on workforce development.
WENDY REDMAN, Vice President
Statewide University System
Anchorage AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Presented University overview on workforce
development.
CLICK BISHOP, Commissioner-Designee
Department of Labor & Workforce Development
Juneau, AK 99802-1149
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on workforce development.
ACTION NARRATIVE
CHAIR JOHNNY ELLIS called the Senate Labor and Commerce Standing
Committee meeting to order at 1:31:09 PM. Present at the call to
order were Senators Stevens, Davis, Bunde and Ellis.
^Overview: Rural Economic Development
CHAIR ELLIS said the committee would begin a series of very
important briefings, first on rural economic development, and
followed by workforce development issues. He said they would
also cover energy issues at a later time and have more workforce
development conversations. These are three of the focus areas
for this committee during the next two years. He began with
Julie Kitka.
JULIE KITKA, President, Alaska Federation of Natives, said that
creating value jobs is important to Alaska Natives. She asked
the committee to listen to some of her ideas for creating them.
1:33:04 PM
First, she asked the legislature to support high-speed tele-
communications and access to high-speed broadband for rural
communities as both a national and a state priority to improve
the ability for people to be connected to the wealth of
information and business opportunities that are available via
the Internet. She urged them to continue having the
infrastructure to support state-of-the-art telecommunications
for Alaska because it will give Alaskans a competitive edge in
the global economy. She suggested looking at models in other
states such as Portland, Oregon, where all citizens have free
access to high-speed broadband to give them an economic edge.
Secondly, she asked them to consider legislation that would
change the state's investment climate, particularly in rural
villages. She said that right now the state has a lot of
business activity, but not much based in the villages. The
simple reasons are their remoteness, isolation, difficulties,
small population and the high cost of transportation. The role
of government in creating incentives to improve the investment
climate is important because those incentives will attract
business opportunities and foster job creation in the villages.
Businesses in the state and others that might want to relocate
to the state need economic incentives to use the rural
workforce.
1:36:40 PM
Third, she asked them to consider feasibility studies for
demonstration projects in Alaska looking at opportunities
created by using economic clusters. The more experimentation in
the economic arena, the better, she said, because the ideas that
work can be fine-tuned and broadened; the ones that don't work
can be discarded.
One area in particular needs a feasibility study, she said - a
free trade zone piloted in Alaska. This might require a
partnership with the U.S. Congress, but she felt Alaskans need
the same tools that other people have to be competitive in the
global economy and some hubs around the world are using free
trade zones for outsourcing and for growing business
opportunities.
Her fourth recommendation was to consider legislation to create
a "knowledge economy" which means basically public policy
choices being made at the legislative level that support
business and government needs for information and
communications. Having the telecommunications network and the
correct investment climate tax policy would allow people to
access the knowledge economy and turn their hubs into
competitive areas in the world. She said some of these
components can be taken on by the University of Alaska.
She emphasized creating pilot projects in rural areas that
demonstrate how people can compete in the global economy. People
from Barrow discussed a demonstration project called an Arctic
Knowledge Village this past summer with Native people from
Canada, Russia, and Greenland. The idea is to connect people
across the north and get them into international trade.
MS. KITKA suggested demonstration projects on workforce
development specifically targeted for the knowledge economy
saying people in rural economies should have all the skills that
any young people can aspire to. She looked forward to developing
a future where young people will want to remain in the state.
1:41:12 PM
MS. KITKA also recommended providing diagnostic support for
communities that want to develop an economic plan saying:
There needs to be some really cutting edge technical
assistance provided by the state partnering with the
private sector on that to be able to give that kind of
diagnostic help to our communities so that they can
fine-tune some of their plans and, again, have more
success as opposed to investment in good money after
bad and have failures.
1:42:28 PM
MS. KITKA said she wanted to spend a little bit of time telling
the committee about the development of commerce and workforce in
the Native community, because Natives had not testified before
the legislature for a while.
She related that the Native community has had tremendous
development over the last several decades particularly in the
areas of governance and community building, economic and social
development and in resource management. They have a growing
sense of inter-connectedness between urban and rural Alaska.
The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) companies have
synthesized Native knowledge into development projects and are
developing models for both Native and non-Native commercial
cooperation in joint ventures. They are doing activities that
promote sustainable development, government procurement and
contracting in meeting some of the toughest standards that the
United States has set up. They are involved in engineering and
construction services, oil and gas exploration, pipelines,
mineral exploration, mining development, wildlife management,
hurricane and disaster recovery, telecommunications and
information technology, tourism, the business of arts and crafts
- making that an economic activity that supports jobs at the
local level. They are developing expertise in working in harsh
and remote environments, worker training, ocean and coastal
management, forestry and fishing.
The non-profit sector has developed a lot of world-class models,
like the telemedicine model and the community health aide model,
which provides 80 percent of the direct health care to people in
villages.
1:46:05 PM
MS. KITKA said that Natives make up about 21 percent of the
state's population providing a tremendous potential for state
and private sector collaboration. So, instead of letting
competition tear people apart or make different regions in the
state go into conflict with each other, she said, people can
look at ways to totally expand the range of opportunities
available for all Alaskans.
She closed saying a recent 30-year trend analysis completed by
the University of Alaska about how Native people have been doing
indicated that tremendous improvement has been made. Infant
mortality and total death rates have gone down, life expectancy
has gone up and there are tremendous signs that living
conditions have improved. Native income has increased every
decade, even after adjusting for inflation, even though Native
income remains far below that of non-Natives.
MS. KITKA said the University study showed that 30 years of
attention by the federal and state governments and Natives,
themselves, decreased the Native poverty rate from 60 percent to
20 percent. She is targeting her effort this next decade on
closing the disparity that remains between Alaska Natives and
other Alaskans who are at 12 percent.
1:50:00 PM
CHAIR ELLIS said the committee is looking for specific issues to
change in statute, budgetary recommendations and regulation
changes. He summed up that Ms. Kitka was encouraging the state
to support high-speed telecommunications, to write legislation
to change the investment climate at the local or village level,
to do a feasibility study for a free trade and outsourcing zone,
to consider a knowledge-based economy eco-system, to support a
demonstration project for an Arctic knowledge village and to
provide technical assistance, workforce development and economic
diagnostic support and for local communities.
MS. KITKA added that she is interested in the state trying to
help put things in place that will help prepare people for the
future and other ideas could be put on the table. The investment
climate would help create economic opportunities for young
people; improved telecommunications would help Alaska to stay on
the cutting edge where it used to be. At this point, Alaska is
in danger of going backwards because technology is passing us
by.
CHAIR ELLIS thanked her and asked to have people send him their
thoughts on further developing these ideas.
1:53:12 PM
ALICE ROGOFF, Chair, Alaska Native Arts Foundation, presented a
film produced by Andrew McClain from Barrow, who is getting his
Masters degree at New York University. It contains profiles of
native artists. She showed the committee the fourth profile on
the film of a Native artist from the Northwest region of Alaska
stating that she hoped to do profiles of artists from around the
state with additional funding.
KAREY IRWIN BROWN, Executive Director, Alaska Native Arts
Foundation, helped with tech issues.
The video ran from 1:54:10 PM to 2:02:36 PM.
MS. ROGOFF said this video has been shown at several film
festivals and will be aired on both French and German public
television. She explained that the Foundation is the newest in a
long line of non-profit entities that have tried to market
Alaska Native art. It has been in existence legally since 2002,
but it has been fully functioning in only the last 2 - 3 years
with a website that allows them to seriously grow sales in the
Lower 48 states.
She said that she is from the East Coast, but she owns a home in
Anchorage. The Foundation began with a very small group of four
people, herself, Barbara Overstreet, Veronica Slager, and Willie
Hensley. She and a friend were flown around Alaska by Pheron
Smith, an Aleut chief pilot for Alaska Airline, and his wife,
Terry Ellis-Smith, from the Ellis Airlines family in Southeast.
The original group decided it could help market Alaska Native
art by virtue of the fact they were located on the East Coast
and that they could somehow put together the right balance of
Alaska Native artists and leaders in Alaska and people on the
East Coast who had access to and knowledge of art retail and
marketing circles.
2:06:13 PM
She related that the Foundation buys the art work for cash at
"what we insist on being fair market prices in Alaska directly
from artists." The art is sold both through its retail gallery
in Anchorage and through wholesale activities to museum shops
and beginning in 2009 to art galleries and auction houses around
the country.
MS. ROGOFF said that two critical pieces have proven to be
surprisingly challenging. One is to spread the word to more
artists so their work can be purchased by the Foundation and
marketed. To date 900 Alaska Natives have registered with the
Foundation as artists. This is because the Foundation wants to
sell each piece of art with the permission of the artist, a
biography and a photograph of the artist. This is not generic
work, but rather one-of-a-kind work by highly talented people.
She explained the Foundation's philosophy is that it pays the
artists more for their works than others do and mark those
prices up uniformly by just 100 percent to help defray the
Foundation's costs. The artists have no problem at all with the
markup to get their work where it can be sold.
2:10:40 PM
She showed the committee an example of a whale-bone covered bowl
with ivory whale's tail saying that not only is the Foundation
challenged by needing to develop the Outside collector market,
she is often confronted by people inside the state who have been
used to buying these works at very low prices. And while they
might get some feedback about that, she reasoned if the artist
lives in Savoonga and his fuel bill is $5,000, it's only fair
that he gets more of the profit for his art. "And that's why
we're here. This is first-person economic development - as we
like to say."
MS. ROGOFF said that artists know how to use high-speed broad
band to send her e-mails with digital pictures of the work that
is for sale. She said the Foundation typically has up to 2,000
pieces for sale at any one time. Its mission is to keep on
buying even if the inventory has to be carried for a long time.
Cash is paid for close to 98 percent of their inventory so
artists can pay their bills.
2:13:20 PM
CHAIR ELLIS asked her to submit specific recommendations for
statute or regulation changes - anything her experience would
feel could improve the situation.
MS. ROGOFF responded that for now the state government as a
whole could remember to add an arts marketing component to
everything that it does.
This is as much an economic engine in the villages as
gaslines and gold mines and lead zinc mines and yet
the state government has resources all around the
country through the Permanent Fund Managers - it grows
exponentially. There are contacts everywhere. So, if
by nothing else than an e-mail chain, that word could
be communicated to every one that the state of Alaska
does business with outside. The faster we grow this
market, the more cash will be in the villages.
^Alaska Workforce Development
2:15:10 PM
CHAIR ELLIS thanked her and announced the committee would move
on to discuss Alaska workforce development.
MIKE ANDREWS, Director, Alaska Works Partnership, Inc., said it
is a non-profit that specializes in construction workforce
development. He wanted to focus on the supply and demand issue
for the construction workforce today and to report that while
there is a continuing gap, a lot of things have been
accomplished - particularly with the help of the legislature in
the last couple of years.
He said the 2006 construction workforce plan that was adopted by
the Alaska Workforce Investment Board lays out eight strategies
across the spectrum from career pathways for folks in secondary
education and high school all the way through training adults
and pipeline training. He emphasized the plan because it was put
together with the state's largest construction associations
including the Associated General Contractors of Alaska and the
Associated Building Contractors of Alaska. The Homebuilders
Association played a part as well as the statewide system of
Universities, AVTEC and other post-secondary institutions.
Organized labor, the constructions trade unions and their
apprenticeship programs were involved, as well.
The plan said, for example, let's do more in terms of connecting
young people to the workforce and last year the legislature
provided funding for the Anchorage Construction Career Academy,
which is a clear example of working with industry to help young
folks in high school get additional courses for career
exploration. A pilot night school at the King Career Center for
adults is also doing well. The school district has reported that
it already expects over 700 vocational education courses to be
taken by high school students in the Anchorage area and the
program has expanded from three high schools offering some
after-hours courses to eight high schools in the district. Over
300 adults are taking courses nights and weekends.
MR. ANDREWS said along with the planning and information, it
takes a commitment from employers to follow through and employ
people who have been trained. In Alaska, the largest evidence of
that is registered trade apprenticeship. He pointed out that in
the last five years while construction jobs have grown by about
11 percent, apprenticeships have grown by 18 percent. Five years
ago there were about 1,000 and now there are over 2,000
registered apprentices in the construction trades. This is where
employers look to bring in new workers they can train and retain
in the industry. He said the combined contributions of both
government and industry have gone a long way to moving Alaskans
into the workforce.
2:20:39 PM
He wants to make sure that Alaskan residents will be able and
ready to work on a gas pipeline and last year the Legislature
provided about $3 million to build a pipeline training facility
in Fairbanks. The Alaska Works Project is heading up that
project, which is moving along on schedule, but they will be
seeking additional funding to finish it. He said it takes
several years of people being on the job to build the skills to
be qualified for those jobs.
2:22:34 PM
CHAIR ELLIS thanked him for his work through the years and for
providing continuity on these issues. He asked him to bring the
committee more specific information about budget requests for
the Fairbanks facility or whatever they need.
MR. ANDREWS agreed to provide the committee with a breakdown on
preliminary costs for the pipeline training facility.
2:23:40 PM
SENATOR BUNDE pointed out that a Labor and Commerce meeting a
few years ago, Dick Cattanach had pointed out that it was
difficult to find people who wanted to get training because of
lack of work ethic and he asked if there is now more demand.
MR. ANDREWS replied the idea that people aren't interested in
these jobs is a myth. King Career Center in Anchorage is totally
packed. Students are even taking classes after school. It has
three or four times more applicants than they have the ability
to train. Both men and women want the opportunities.
2:26:25 PM
CHAIR ELLIS said the message has gotten through. Kids are
clamoring for these kinds of classes.
2:27:02 PM
MR. ANDREWS stated that the demand is statewide.
2:27:13 PM
WENDY REDMAN, Vice President, Statewide University System, added
that it's not true that vocational education is for students who
don't want to go the college. The requirements to enter most of
the apprenticeship programs are just as high as for most
baccalaureate programs.
High school vocational programs provide math, reading and
writing skills in an applied way "that students are resonating
with." She said getting more money into the high school
vocational programs is the most essential thing of all right now
- "probably even more important than funding for the
University."
2:28:52 PM
SENATOR BUNDE mentioned that you have to have a high school
diploma to get into an apprenticeship program, but you can into
a university without a high school diploma.
MS. REDMAN responded by explaining that while admission is open,
a high school diploma is required when you apply for a program
and a degree.
2:29:51 PM
MS. REDMAN said the University has been very active in the last
eight years in responding to the high demand job occupations of
the state. It focuses on programs that only the University can
provide - primarily those programs that are offered for credit.
They also do a lot of non-credit.
2:30:33 PM
She said the University does more in the oil, gas and mining
areas than anybody. The Mining and Petroleum Training program
out of the Kenai campus essentially is the go-to group for all
of the mining training in the state. Last year it served almost
2,000 students statewide in credit and non-credit training. They
have been very active in Juneau with Greens Creek and Kensington
offering everything from safety to rescue and recovery - almost
all non credit. The University has petroleum and mining
engineering programs, baccalaureate, masters and PhD programs,
as well, but the bulk of the work is really the non credit
delivery.
When the oil industry became concerned about replacing oil
workers on the North Slope about six years ago, a process
industry consortium (APIC) program was established using
industry money initially with help from the state. She said it's
most important that the curriculum is up-to-date and that
employers give preference to the students who have gone through
the training. Two-hundred thirty-five students have graduated
from that program and 95 percent of them are now employed in
this state. This two-year program is run in Fairbanks, Anchorage
and Kenai and has been a tremendous success.
2:32:49 PM
MS. REDMAN said the construction training for the gas line will
be done primarily through apprenticeship programs. Industry
wanted a construction management program and worked with her to
develop its first two-year program. The first class graduated
from UAA last year and all 40 students are now employed. The
program is now getting started in Fairbanks and industry has
given the University $100,000 to develop the baccalaureate
degree that will start in the fall 2007 semester. The skills
needed to be a construction manager are so complex that they
can't really be accommodated in a two-year degree. More business
and logistics and better writing skills are needed.
2:35:22 PM
MS. REDMAN said that engineering is the other big push and she
is working on doubling the number of those graduated. Enrollment
is up 62 percent in Anchorage and 40 percent in Fairbanks.
Graduation rates are also up, which is more difficult for
engineering, because this is their most difficult curriculum. It
is a five-year program and "that's working your rear off the
whole way through." With engineering, in particular, they need
to get to the students while they are still in junior high
school. Anchorage and Fairbanks are the focus for the
University's engineering programs. There is interest at the
Juneau campus, which is starting a "one-plus-three program" this
year. So students will be able to complete the first year here
and move up to Anchorage or Fairbanks and complete the program.
Anchorage and Fairbanks have "two-plus-two programs" where they
share curriculum and students go back and forth because
Anchorage doesn't have the full compliment of all of the
programs. These are the University's two big responses to the
construction industry.
MS. REDMAN said that UAS has a one and a two-year program in
construction technology, which has been very successful. The
Interior Aleutians campus in Fort Yukon has a federally funded
program working primarily with Native non-profits training
people in the villages. This has been very successful, but it is
very regionalized. The University is working on making sure the
skills that people are learning in these programs are
transferable. She wants to make sure that all the construction-
related programs are integrated and linked with the
apprenticeship programs. She said:
The fact is if anybody is going to really move into
construction, they are going to be in one of the
unions eventually. So, we want to make sure they are
not going to waste any time so that the training they
are taking is going to be able to be transferable to
the apprenticeship program and they will get the
appropriate credit when they move in.
2:39:15 PM
She said the University has a very good relationship working
with the unions, particularly in Fairbanks, but it is getting
better all the time in Anchorage, as well. They share facilities
and faculty members because they have to. "None of us have
enough resources at this point."
All of the workforce training programs have industry advisory
councils that are made up of people that are there to look at
the curriculum and to look at the standards to make sure that
everything is being taught according to industry standards and
that credits are transferable from one campus to another as well
as from the University to the apprenticeship programs.
MS. REDMAN said the University has an interesting program that
hasn't had a lot of takers yet, but she anticipates it will get
better - an apprenticeship-to-university training program. She
said that most of the apprenticeship programs are extremely
intense and some need only take 12 credits in order to get their
AA.
Partnerships with schools are of the most help to the University
and it has a close relationship with the Hutchison Career Center
in Fairbanks, the King Career Center in Anchorage, the regional
voc tech centers and most of the smaller high schools in the
state. They are trying to make it easier for the younger
students to move on.
2:41:26 PM
She said that summer camps and career awareness programs are
fabulous opportunities and she urged the legislature to
continuing supporting them. She emphasized that the adult basic
education programs that are funded through Department of Labor
and Workforce Development (DOLWD) are really essential, because
they pick up the adult learners. A huge population needs English
as a second language and a GED so they can be trained. This got
a little money last year, but it needs a lot more. She concluded
by urging them to help get more money into high school
vocational programs and noted that the University has about
$900,000 worth of requests in its operating budget.
2:43:23 PM
SENATOR BUNDE said he thought that Commissioner Sampson,
Department of Education and Early Development (DEED), should be
here because he has mentioned trying to reach the middle school
students. He also mentioned that having faculty work with
business people is not a new approach. "We do that in community
college all the time. If the legislature hadn't destroyed the
community college at the behest of the University 20 years ago,
we'd be ahead of the game right now."
2:44:14 PM
CHAIR ELLIS thanked Ms. Redman for her presentation and invited
Click Bishop to speak to the committee on workforce development.
COMMISSIONER-DESIGNEE, CLICK BISHOP, Department of Labor and
Workforce Development (DOLWD), acknowledged there has been a
great effort by industry and education to get together. He said
that Alaska's construction workforce exceeds 30,000 individuals.
Over 20 percent are non-resident according to Permanent Fund
data. Total industry wages are over $1 billion per year. Non-
resident wages total $150 million per year. The construction
industry needs to add 1,000 new jobs every year through 2012.
The average annual wage for resident construction workers is
$37,000 per year.
2:47:08 PM
COMMISSIONER-DESIGNEE BISHOP stated that there needs to be more
apprenticeship opportunities across the spectrum and across the
state. Other businesses need to think about the apprenticeship
model for bringing people into the work force because "It
works." More Alaskans need to be employed in the industry, both
urban and rural.
He said more jobs need to be created. "If you've got jobs, your
workforce development follows hand in hand." He supported
engaging high schools in preparing students for post secondary
vocational education training and expanding the university and
other post-secondary degree and non degree programs.
He related how he partnered the diesel heavy equipment program
at the Tanana campus with the University 16 years ago and how
building relationships like that are important. Unemployment in
rural Alaska is too high and they need to work closer with the
Alaska Native organizations to improve Alaska Native hire. Other
successful training programs need to be funded.
2:50:54 PM
SENATOR BUNDE asked him to comment on the workforce demand for
the gas pipeline.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP said he would talk with him about that at
his leisure.
CHAIR ELLIS inserted that they should share any updated
information with the committee.
2:52:29 PM
MS. REDMAN added one thing - that Ms. Kitka brought up an issue
of tremendous importance for the University as well as the K-12
system - dealing with the telecommunications infrastructure in
the state.
It needs some focus.... Nobody seems to be interested.
It's a huge problem and it will make a tremendous
difference for job training, for education, for
economic development....
CHAIR ELLIS agreed to focus on that issue because it overarches
a lot of different areas. There being no further business to
come before the committee, he adjourned the meeting at 2:53:49
PM.
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