HBA-EDN H.B. 476 77(R)BILL ANALYSIS


Office of House Bill AnalysisH.B. 476
By: Naishtat
Economic Development
7/17/2001
Enrolled



BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE 

State law mandates that recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy
Families (TANF) attempt to locate employment.  Local workforce development
boards (board) are responsible for contracting with community organizations
and businesses to provide employment placement services.  Prior to the 77th
Legislature, the accountability measures attached to a board's funding
rewarded placement of applicants into jobs, but not necessarily placement
into higher wage jobs.  House Bill 476 directs the Texas Workforce
Commission to develop accountability measures and provide incentives for
the placement and retention of TANF recipients in jobs which provide wages
and hours of work adequate to lift the participants to self-sufficiency. 

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that rulemaking
authority is expressly delegated to the Texas Workforce Commission in
SECTION 1 (Sections 302.009 and 302.010, Labor Code) of this bill. 

ANALYSIS

House Bill 476 amends the Labor Code to require the Texas Workforce
Commission (TWC), by rule, to develop a job placement incentive program
(incentive program) under which persons with whom local workforce
development boards (boards) contract for employment services are provided
incentives for placing recipients of financial assistance into higher wage
jobs. The bill requires TWC to develop  guidelines for the incentive
program and to administer the incentive program through the boards.  The
bill also requires a board that provides a monetary incentive to a person
with whom the board has contracted under the incentive program to require
the person to use the money for expenses relating to education, training,
and support services necessary to prepare, place, and maintain recipients
of financial assistance in jobs paying wages that allow those recipients to
attain self-sufficiency. 

 H.B. 476 requires TWC, by rule, to develop guidelines under which boards
provide postemployment services to a recipient of financial assistance.
The bill sets forth requirements for TWC in developing and assisting the
boards in meeting the guidelines.  The bill requires TWC to develop,
subject to the appropriation of funds, the incentive program and the
postemployment services guidelines no later than January 1, 2002.   

The bill requires TWC to encourage boards to provide postemployment case
management services for recipients of financial assistance under these
provisions and who have, in comparison to other recipients, higher levels
of barriers to employment.   

EFFECTIVE DATE

September 1, 2001.