Linking Green Job Training and Community Economic Development

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Linking Green Job Training and Community Economic
Development

• Office of Community Service (OCS)
• CED/JOLI New Grantees Conference
• February 18, 2009

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Be Smart About Green Jobs

• The energy, enthusiasm, and investment in
  the green economy runs the risk of getting
  ahead of itself
• Be clear about what you mean when you talk about
  green jobs
• Use good data on labor market opportunities and
  skills gaps to drive green job initiatives
• Measure and evaluate green jobs programsfocus on
  outcomes

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Sustain Good Jobs Through Green Partnerships

• The promise of green jobs is realized when
  smart economic development is linked with
  thoughtful workforce training.
• Employ energy standards as green job creation
  tools
• Promote green industry clusters
• Design green jobs initiative to both save
  existing jobs and create new ones
• Link green economic and workforce development
• Create capacity for green industry partnerships
• Integrate green jobs initiatives into existing
  workforce systems

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Make Sure Green Jobs Pay Off for Workers and
Communities

• The greatest promise of green jobs is
  recognized only if we are smart about generating
  good jobs that are accessible to the people who
  need those jobs this requires focused attention
  on job quality, job access for all, and upward
  mobility in the green economy.
• Maximize community benefits by mandating them
• Build greener career pathways
• Extend green ladders to build real pathways out
  of poverty

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Linking Economic Development
and Workforce Development

• To maximize the promise of green jobs, green
  economic and workforce development should
• Spur regional, sector-based economic development
  that is locally sustainable and designed to
  promote broad-based community development
• Invest in workforce development intermediaries
  and labor market institutions that can best guide
  such development, bringing all playerslabor,
  industry, education, government, and community
  representatives
• Develop demand-driven career pathways to ensure
  that prospective and incumbent workers have clear
  and accessible training paths to better jobs with
  higher wages and benefits, and that there are
  clear pathways for workers trying to move out of
  poverty

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Models for Green-Collar Job-Training Partnerships
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Iowas New Job
Training Program (NJTP)

• Iowa Central Community college recently used the
  NJTP to support five start-up biofuel plants.
  The companies sought skilled and experienced
  workers, preferably with 2-year degrees the
  community college issued bonds to support
  training programs for the new jobs.

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Examples of
Converting Latent Industrial Capacity
Texas-based Trinity Structural Towers
reconfigured an idle manufacturing plant in
Clinton, IL, with help from a 2M investment
package put together by the state in 2007.
Shuttered for 5 years, the old freight car plant
began shipping 100-ton towers to Midwest wind
farms in July 2008. Trinity plans to train and
employ 140 people
Spains Acciona Windpower converted a former
hydraulics facility into a turbine-generator
manufacturing plant in West Branch, IA. The
retooled plant opened its doors in January 2008
and employed 110 workers by June
Upstart Tower Tech Holdings, Inc. is now
fabricating steel sheets into wind turbines in
Manitowoc, WI, in an old factory once used to
build submarines. Not only did the company
benefit from the existing facility, but also
draws on the area clusters history of
manufacturing heavy and sophisticated machinery.
From August 2006 to November 2007, the company
doubled its workforce to 70
Diab Inc. in Desoto, TX, originally a
manufacturer for the marine and aerospace
industries, now employed 230 workers producing
foam and balsa wood cores for 200-foot wind
turbine blades
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Show Me the (Federal) Money

• Tremendous interest in green jobs and the green
  economy at the federal level
• Numerous agenciesDOL, EPA, Commerce, NIST,
  NSFare engaged in green jobs policy
  conversations
• Other agencies promoting initiatives that will
  drive green jobs HHS (weatherization), HUD
  (retrofitting public housing), DoEd (retrofitting
  schools)

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Show Me the (Federal) Money

• Green Jobs Act of 2007 part of the Energy Bill
• Huge investment in energy efficiency and
  renewable energy in American Reinvestment and
  Recovery Act

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Join Us
www.WorkforceAlliance.org
www.Skills2Compete.org
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• Rachel Gragg, Ph.D.
• Federal Policy Director
• The Workforce Alliance
• rachelg_at_workforcealliance.org
• 202-223-8991, ext 102
• www.workforcealliance.org