[NCL_Update] H.R. 1261 Passes in the House

[Jon Randall]

National Coalition for Literacy Update
May 15, 2003

On May 8th, H.R. 1261, "The Workforce Reinvestment and Adult Education Act
of 2003" passed on the House floor by a vote of 220-to 204. This is the
House version of a bill to reauthorize (renew) the Workforce Investment Act
of 1998. It is important to note the closeness of the vote. Calls by our
field may have persuaded some to vote against the bill. To see how your
Representative voted, go to
http://clerkweb.house.gov/cgi-bin/vote.exe?year=2003&rollnumber=175 . If you
called the office of your Congressperson urging him/her to vote against the
bill, please call back to say thank you.

PROVISIONS WE LIKE
There are several key provisions in H.R. 1261 that are good for the field.
They include ...

	retention of the broad purposes of the adult education (not just
employability)
	reduction of employment-related indicators of performance to
non-core indicators
	retention of the direct and equitable access requirement
	retention of a set-aside for corrections
	retention of the maintenance of effort and matching requirements
	restoration of adult education representation on local workforce
investment boards* (restored via amendment)

POOR PUBLIC POLICY
There are provisions in H.R. 1261 that are detrimental to the field. They
include ...

	making for-profit agencies eligible providers 
	maintaining State leadership funds at 12.5 percent despite calls in
the legislation for greater accountability and higher quality
	narrowing the definition of literacy to just reading
	gutting the ability of the National Institute for Literacy to serve
the adult literacy field (gutting it in so many ways that it must be the
subject of a separate update)
	paying for One-Stop infrastructure from partner programs'
reservations for administration** (added via amendment)

* Restoration of adult education representation on local workforce boards
... As per the Allen (D-ME) amendment, adult ed would be the only One-Stop
partner represented on the local board and the process for selecting this
representative is not clear. Although the amendment isn't perfect, Rep.
Allen deserves our thanks for getting it into the bill. 

** Paying for One-Stop infrastructure from the partner programs'
reservations for administration ... As per the Kline (R-MN) amendment, the
Governor is directed to consider the proportionate use of one-stop centers
by each partner, the costs of administration unrelated to the use of
one-stop centers by each partner, and other relevant factors in determining
the funds contributed to One-Stop infrastructure from each partner AND
funding must come from each partner's reservation for program
administration. This is problematic because the reservation for state
administration is firmly capped at 5% and could not support both One-Stop
administration and administration of the adult ed program in the state. If
this were to become law, the only way around it might be to increase the
local grantees' administrative limit and take it from there. The bottom line
in this scenario is funding for direct instruction would be used to pay
whatever amount the Governor assessed as adult ed's share of one-stop
infrastructure costs. It should be noted that prior to consideration of
amendments, the Republican-controlled Rules Committee accepted this
amendment for consideration and prevented consideration of an amendment by
Rep. Tierney (D-MA) to make One-Stop infrastructure a separate line-item
under Title I of the bill. Rep. Tierney deserves our thanks for trying. His
would have been a much cleaner and fairer solution.

End Note ... My apologies for not getting this update out sooner. I saw a
message very similar to the first paragraph of this one on another listserv
and thought "Well, there's no point in my repeating the news." An update
request I received yesterday made me realize that some folks may rely on
this list alone for info. Thanks Pat!

Best,
Jon

Jon Randall
Consultant, Government Relations
PROLITERACY Worldwide
and Public Policy Committee Chair
National Coalition for Literacy
www.natcoalitionliteracy.org

PROLITERACY Worldwide underwrites 
the coordination of NCL public policy efforts
www.proliteracy.org

FedStrategics, LLC
8413 Park Crest Drive, Silver Spring, MD 20910
Tel: (301) 588-5304   Fax: (301) 588-5353
jrandall at fedstrategics.com


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