Legislature(2009 - 2010)BELTZ 105 (TSBldg)
01/28/2010 02:00 PM Senate LABOR & COMMERCE
| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| Gasline Training Overview | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
| + | TELECONFERENCED | ||
ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
SENATE LABOR AND COMMERCE STANDING COMMITTEE
January 28, 2010
2:06 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Joe Paskvan, Chair
Senator Joe Thomas, Vice Chair
Senator Bettye Davis
Senator Kevin Meyer
Senator Con Bunde
MEMBERS ABSENT
All members present
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
Gasline Training Overview
PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION
No Previous Action to Report
WITNESS REGISTER
CLICK BISHOP, Commissioner
Department of Labor and Workforce Development (DOLWD),
POSITION STATEMENT: Delivered Gasline Training overview.
ACTION NARRATIVE
2:06:10 PM
CHAIR JOE PASKVAN called the Senate Labor and Commerce Standing
Committee meeting to order at 2:06 p.m. All members were present
at the call to order.
^Gasline Training Overview
Gasline Training Overview
2:07:16 PM
CHAIR PASKVAN announced that the Gasline Training Overview would
be the committee's order of business today.
2:07:51 PM
CLICK BISHOP, Commissioner, Department of Labor and Workforce
Development (DOLWD), introduced department staff in the
audience. He said says the 2007 Alaska Gasline Inducement Act
(in AS 43.90.470) requires the commissioner of the DOLWD to
develop a job training program that would provide training for
Alaskans in gas pipeline management, construction, operations,
maintenance and other related positions. He said he assembled a
team of industry providers, University partners, K-12 educators,
pipeline contractors and other stakeholders to develop the plan
before them today.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP said that plan's overall purpose is "to
bring Alaskans into a new era of collaboration, innovation among
educators and training providers combined with strategic
investments [indisc.] regionally delivered and accredited
programs to create a world class training and educational
system."
He said the plan identified four broad strategies; number one
was to increase awareness of access to career opportunities in
natural resource development. A strategy was identified to
implement the plan in the 2008-2012 timeline. Another outcome in
the plan was to retain a public relations-type person to raise
awareness, and they have hired Beth Leshper for that position.
He said whether Alaska gets a gas pipeline today or not, this is
a good plan and tool, because the skills gap exists today in
Alaska's industries. This work will not go to waste.
2:13:22 PM
COMMISSIONER BISHOP said that people are starting to regard this
plan as a model template for delivering a trained workforce. It
is expandable with nuances to facilitate the type of training
people are trying to deliver. For example, the health care
industry is using it to develop a health care delivery system.
The second strategy, he said, is to develop a comprehensive
integrated career and technical education system [section
32(1)(a) of the plan] that aligns training institutions and
coordinates program delivery; for this they have hired Jeff
Selby, a retired tech/vocational educator, who put together the
Northwestern Alaska Career and Technical Center model in the
Bering Straits School District.
Recently, Commissioner Bishop said he signed an MOU with the
commissioner of the Department of Education and Early
Development (DEED), Larry LeDoux, to develop a statewide career
pathway training plan for all K-12 schools. It takes time to put
a program of this magnitude together, and they are drawing
heavily on outside expertise. Their target is to have the draft
plan in place by April/May of this year.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP reported that he is continuing to meet with
regional training centers around the state to deliver a
workforce, but they have a long way to go.
2:16:14 PM
Strategy three is increasing opportunities for registered
apprenticeships in skilled occupations and other structured
training opportunities. He brought Jerry Andrews on several
years ago to help with that. Early on they were going to recruit
and hire a pipeline training coordinator to bring this plan to
fruition, but he has been cautious about bringing on another
full time person at this point, so he has asked Mr. Andrews to
"do double duty for a while." He is familiar with the plan, one
of the strategies fits his purview real well with the
apprenticeship model, and he has TAPS pipeline experience.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP noted that the TransCanada ExxonMobil open
season FERC filing is tomorrow, and that application will be
public information. It will have the estimated manpower numbers
for the whole project including compressor stations and main
line construction. He will take those numbers to a February 24
AGIA training team meeting and start the real work of
extrapolating the execution, delivery method, training, and cost
of delivering a workforce.
2:19:45 PM
He reread strategy one about increasing awareness of access to
careers and elaborated that this requires investments in the
Alaska Construction Academy Model around the state to introduce
youth and dislocated adult workers to basic construction skills,
to provide funding for school-based career guides who provide
job referrals to secondary students, to provide funding for
improvements to the Alaska Career Information System and other
department web-based resources that provide career planning
tools and connect students with the Alaska-based training
programs.
COMMISISONER BISHOP said one of the outcomes he has wanted since
he began this position is to "warehouse" the gasline career
training information in one place, both electronic and hard
copy. He said the students, not the youth career guides, at King
Career Center took the 113 AGIA-related occupations and went
researched things like wage scales, where to get training, and
who the training providers are - for all the occupations. He
made a few suggestions and they are "tweaking" it, but he wants
to put that document in every school throughout the state. As a
foot note, he said in FY09 the Alaska Construction Academy
trained 1,645 youths and 416 adults.
2:23:55 PM
COMMISSIOINER BISHOP moved on to strategy two, aligning career
and technical education systems, and elaborated that the
department has coordinated several meetings between training
providers in the state including the University of Alaska, the
Alaska Vocational Tech Center and regional training centers on
how to better align and articulate training programs. They are
also working closely with the Department of Education and Early
Development (DEED) toward developing a template for career plans
to be completed by all high school students establishing
standards for Alaska training programs, supporting the youth of
the Alaska Career Readiness Certificate and doing communication
outreach with both secondary and post-secondary educators and
administrators throughout the state.
2:24:54 PM
COMMISISONER BISHOP said another huge hurdle is aligning assets
with the goal of establishing industry standards among regional
training programs. Strategy three is expanding registered
apprenticeships and structured training. The department has made
a commitment by reaching out not only to the industries that
have traditionally used the apprenticeship model, but also for
workers in the skill trades such as construction, and other
high-demand industries in Alaska including health care,
manufacturing and retail trade. This has been done by the "old
fashioned method" having discussions with one employer at a
time. Just this morning he was talking about health care
apprenticeships for certified nursing assistants - which could
be called a non-traditional area of apprenticeship.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP conveyed that he is making strides in the
mining industry as well. He had to allow 20 foreign labors to
come in and run geophysical core drills, and their annual
salaries were $100,000/year, but he said "enough" and after a
year-and-a-half-long collaboration between labor, industry, the
University, and Native corporations they have the first core
driller apprenticeship class in Kotzebue. This last spring, 36
core drillers, all local to the region, went through the
program, and all were employed for the summer. Now they have a
registered apprenticeship pathway to segue these people into
journeyman status - and they can become a $100,000/year driller.
Success breeds success, Commissioner Bishop said, and now Tanana
Chiefs Conference, Tower Hill International, wants to do a
first-of-its-kind class in Fairbanks for a gold mine in
Livengood.
2:30:28 PM
Strategy 4, the Commissioner reported, is to increase training
opportunities; and to give members a broad bush overview, he
said the state made more significant investments including
doubling the number of the University's engineering students,
providing over $3 million in training for a variety of gas
pipeline occupations to over 1,570 adults in the state training
and employment program. A federal pipeline training grant is
being used by the Galena City School District to train rural
aircraft dispatchers - skills that can be transferred to
transportation and logistical support for the pipeline
construction.
In a little bit of a wrap up he said that he is looking forward
to getting the numbers from both projects' filings with FERC for
an open season so he can see where the state is for manpower.
Both Denali and TransCanada people are working on the training
plan. He emphasized that you can't lose sight of the goal; this
is not just about training for the mainline pipeline
construction, it is about training for upstream jobs that will
be here after the mainline construction is gone.
2:35:33 PM
CHAIR PASKVAN said it's good news that we are moving forward on
the development of the plan and it's good to see they are
approaching the implementation phase with some of the successes
the Commissioner has noted. He asked how many years before
Alaska is ready.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP answered approximately four years; but post
pipeline training is good also for jobs that haven't been
identified yet.
2:37:41 PM
CHAIR PASKVAN asked what would happen if a small diameter
pipeline were to be built instead of the big one.
COMISSIONER BISHOP said he would be happy to train for either. A
smaller pipeline would create a great opportunity for a shake
down on the big pipe. It'll take all the same equipment.
CHAIR PASKVAN said it ultimately comes down to the budget and
how much of it can go for training.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP said that he has a 10-year budget with place
holders in it.
2:41:37 PM
CHAIR PASKVAN followed up the commissioner's commentary on the
113 job classifications by asking when that schedule would be
distributed to the high schools.
COMMISSIONER BISHOP answered starting in 2010.
[The power in the building went out at approximately 2:42; Chair
Paskvan took an at ease at approximately 2:45 and then adjourned
the meeting at approximately 3:00 p.m. when the power had not
returned.]
| Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| Gasline Training Plan SLC January 2010.pdf |
SL&C 1/28/2010 2:00:00 PM |
|
| AGIA Training Plan Q Report January 2010 (5).doc |
SL&C 1/28/2010 2:00:00 PM |