Members in attendance: Roger Hale, Chair; Don Gerdesmeier, Vice Chair; LaDonna Boyd, Wayne DeBruin (by phone), Michael Dolan (by phone), Mary Haug (by phone), Jennie Lightfoot, David MacKenzie, Richard McFarland.

GWDC Staff in attendance: Kathy Sweeney, MDES; Ron Dreyer, MnSCU; Dan Smith, CFL

Charlie Robinson, Larry Eisenstadt and Sandy Seemann from the Adult Training and Dislocated Worker Program Staff, MDES, presented the attached agenda for discussion and review of the committee (Note: See attached copy of the agenda).

Sandy Seemann presented comments on challenges encountered in the process of writing the report. One example cited was the differing data practices issues between the Department of Labor and the Department of Education.

A question was raised as to why the Minnesota State College and University (MnSCU) data was missing from the draft study. Ron Dreyer from MnSCU, explained that MnSCU had just released their data to MDES on December 21. He further cited concerns of MnSCU releasing privacy data that may be subject to FERPA. Mr. Dreyer also stated that it was assumed that information provided to the Governor’s Mini-Cabinet was also being sent to the Department of Economic Security.

Staff from the three agencies represented at the meeting discussed the ongoing conflicts between the two federal laws of Workforce Investment Act (WIA) and the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Chairman Hale asked that it be noted in the record that this conflict in two federal laws, which should be in alignment, should be brought to the attention of Minnesota’s congressional delegation for their assistance in resolution. Sandy noted that another area of confusion is in the scope of the study and explained that the current effort is a compilation of agency-reported information and because individuals are often provided services in more than one program, often in more than in one agency, there is currently no methodology to avoid some duplication of count. Staff noted that a more sophisticated analysis would certainly require more resources and Chair Hale asked whether that extra cost would produce enough value to make the investment worthwhile. Staff explained too that the current study is not designed to answer questions such as how one program works when compared with another very different program. Program staff who participated in the study often had a desire to add what they viewed as essential additional items about the value of their program; these were not added based on MDES’s desire to follow the letter and spirit of the legislation.

Mr. Hale pointed out that the job of the Executive Committee is to look at whether the format of the draft report meets both the letter and the spirit of the law. He noted that as the Chair of the Citizens League Report (published in November 1999), he has encountered many legislators and other interested parties who are waiting anxiously for this report. Mr. Hale also stated that whatever the Committee and the Council can do to get the report ready for its release will be a valuable contribution to fostering informed public discussion on workforce program issues. Committee members were urged to read the draft study carefully. Staff were asked to follow up the meeting with directions to all of the members about where to send additional feedback. (Note: see attached copy of the letter sent out the next day informing members of how to provide such feedback.)

Members of the Executive Committee each gave feedback regarding the general readability of the draft and Ms. Seemann was commended for presenting the material in a clear and reader-friendly style. Chairman Hale noted that the classification system used in the report, which divides programs, by customers is useful in and of itself since it helps to make sense of the state and federal investments in a wide variety of workforce development efforts.

Comments were also presented on how to improve the readability of the report further; those suggestions were related to moving text and headers so that the reader would have an opportunity to get into the facts of the report immediately rather than starting as the draft does, with a nine page introduction/history. Members agreed on a strategy to recommend retaining the essential history as the first page of the report and moving the more contextual analysis to the appendix of the report.