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Happy summer! We are pleased to announce the addition of four new members to the Minneapolis Workforce Development Board. Welcome Ravie Singh – US Bank, Marcus Pope – Youthprise, Jamie Mailer – Xcel Energy, and Kyle Punton – Kemps. |
Governor Walz and DEED Commissioner Varilek share remarks on Minnesota Forward Fund |
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Governor Walz and DEED Commissioner Varilek share remarks on Minnesota Forward FundAs a member of the Minnesota CHIPS Coalition, City of Minneapolis Employment and Training Director, Deb Bahr-Helgen, joined local leaders at Polaris Semiconductor in Bloomington to hear remarks from Governor Tim Walz and new DEED Commissioner, Matt Verilek, regarding Minnesota’s recently approved Minnesota Forward Fund. This $500 million investment helps create a pipeline of skilled workers who are prepared to enter high-growth and high-wage industries, such as semi-conductors. The fund also provides a state match for federal CHIPS and Science Act funds supporting regional growth and the creation of 10,000 new jobs.
The Minnesota CHIPS Coalition is supported by the Greater MSP Partnership and comprised of manufacturers, supply-chain partners, education and training partners, labor organizations, and state and local governments.
Minneapolis Employment and Training Awarded DEED Youth @ Work Grant
The Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) has awarded the City of Minneapolis Employment and Training a total of $775,000 in the Youth @ Work grant to support Step Up activities for both 2023 and 2024. Step Up has a culture of innovation, rooted in equity, serving historically underrepresented, BIPOC, and young people with disabilities in Minneapolis. In 2023-2024, Step Up will offer more diverse programming to engage deeply, with opportunities spanning from paid summer online Career Exploration to paid remote or hybrid internships to traditional in-person work experiences. With the support of the Youth at Work grant opportunity, we aim to serve Minneapolis young people with meaningful, high-quality experience and supports, and assist them on their pathway to educational and career success.
City of Mpls & DEED Event - Driver's License For All Information Session on July 12
Wednesday, July 12 from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at South Minneapolis CareerForce 777 East Lake Street Minneapolis MN 55407
This event will feature a panel presentation focused on “Drivers’ Licenses for All” legislation. All guests are welcome to attend this portion of the event (from 11-12:30) to learn about this important new law. We’ll then transition to the Job Fair, from 12:30-2:00, outdoors, under a tent in the CareerForce parking lot.
Schedule of events and more details
Summary of the Workforce Development investments made at the 2023 Minnesota Legislative Session
The legislative session concluded with the House and Senate completing their work with about two hours to spare. It was a historic legislative session for investments in workforce development. The Jobs and Labor final bill was signed by the Governor and below are some details related to workforce development.
Minnesota Youth Program (MYP) funded at $8,561,000 each year (FY24 and FY25)—just over doubling the current allocation! This partially funds Step Up, in Minneapolis.
- Increases age of eligibility to 24 (something for which the MN Association of Workforce Boards advocated).
- Drive for Five Program funded at $10M for each year, includes:
- $7M for competitive job training grants in technology, labor, caring professions, manufacturing, and educational and professional services sectors.
- $2M for job placement grants for trade associations and chambers (this presents a great partnership opportunity for local boards).
- $1M for business services reps across the state staffed by DEED—intended to work with employers in the Drive for Five industries and to connect them to jobseekers and resources. The Governor was seeking more funding here to hire 16 BSRs—one for each local areas—so at this funding level we are unsure how many can be hired.
- Established the Office of New Americans in the base at $750,000 per year.
- This purpose of the office is to foster immigrant and refugee inclusion through an intentional process to improve economic mobility, enhance civic participation, and improve receiving communities' openness to immigrants and refugees by incorporating the needs and aspirations of immigrants and refugees, their families, and their communities for the benefit of all. The office will be housed at DEED but will across agencies.
- Targeted Populations Workforce Programs funded at $25M each year for the biennium:
- $18.5M for grants to CBOs with no more than $1M in annual budget and has primary office located in a historically underserved community of color or low-income community.
- $1.5M for DEI training for employers—small businesses can apply for grants of no more than 30k to implement DEI training programs.
- $5M for Capacity building grants to eligible CBOs.
- Programs in the base such as P2P and RC3 are level funded.
- There’s approximately $21M in the bill for various childcare programs in an effort to increase the availability of childcare offerings in the state—including developing the Office of Child Care Community Partnerships within DEED.
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Workforce Development Fund—the final bill takes more out of the WDF than the House and Senate bills did, although it still leaves more for the State Dislocated Worker program than in previous years. (We are at an estimated 58% increase from the current biennium!).
- The Older Workers Program that DEED had proposed was not included in the final bill.
- There are many direct allocations to non-profit organizations that we partner with. See the spreadsheet below those details.
Final bill: https://www.house.mn.gov/comm/docs/Z4uoUgoHmUu0FHnVDUa95w.pdf
Spreadsheet: https://www.house.mn.gov/comm/docs/bkbUEiUvWUyAa7qBGQbPJg.pdf
The City of Minneapolis Employment and Training/Minneapolis Workforce Development Board is a member of the Minnesota Association of Workforce Boards. For more information on the legislative session, contact Jeanna Fortney, Director, Minnesota Association of Workforce Boards: Jeanna.fortney@mncounties.org
Minneapolis Employment and Training 2022 Annual Summary
In 2022, Minneapolis Employment and Training, along with our valued network of workforce partners, provided services and activities that benefited career seekers in the City of Minneapolis. The Minneapolis Workforce Development Board worked to strengthen collaborative partnerships and programming to better support job quality, racial equity, and worker voice.
We're excited to share the release of our Minneapolis Employment and Training 2022 Annual Report. In this report, you will find:
- 2022 changes in the Minneapolis Workforce Development Board Leadership.
- Minneapolis Employment and Training 2022 highlights of program activity and new initiatives.
- What we do and how we do our work to impact residents
- Analysis of who we serve, performance outcomes and impact in the community
- Spotlight on Step Up, Afghan and Ukrainian evacuees, Dislocated Workers and Guaranteed Basic Income
- Map of workforce partners locations
- Leadership detail of the Minneapolis Workforce Development Board and Minneapolis City Council
The 2022 Annual Report can also be found on the Minneapolis Employment and Training website.
Employment and Training Announces New Career Pathways Grantees
In April, Minneapolis Employment and Training (MET) announced eight new Career Pathways awards to seven different community-based organizations across the City. Career Pathways has been a successful workforce development program led by MET dating back to 2018. The goal of every Career Pathways program is to help adults find their path to a career in high-demand jobs in a wide range of industries.
The newly awarded Career Pathways programs provide training in a variety of sectors including healthcare, technology, office administration, green jobs, and hair styling. Some awards are renewing current successful programs, while others are innovative workforce development programs being launched for the first time. Awards range between $90,000 - $250,000 beginning June 1, 2023, and run for 12-24 months.
The eight new programs will join 13 existing Career Pathways training programs already being provided for low-income residents in Minneapolis. MET is excited and confident each of these new programs will continue the ongoing success of Career Pathways.
See list of MET Career Pathways Program Partners
Youth Summer Employment during the Pandemic Recession
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By Oriane Casale, Assistant Director of the Labor Market Information Office of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED)
Teen employment levels have increased, unemployment rates are at records lows, wages and hours worked are at record highs, and teens fill a higher share of jobs than in the years leading up to the pandemic. This is good news for employers who have summer positions to fill and for teens who want to gain work experience and earn money for expenses or college. This article includes tips for teens who are looking for work and for employers who are looking to hire teen workers.
Teen Employment Trends
The pandemic recession hit employed youth hard in 2020 because youth are most likely to work in customer facing service sector jobs, exactly the jobs that disappeared during the COVID-19 Recession. As a result, youth unemployment (age 16 to 19 year olds) rose to 13.8% in January 2021 in Minnesota on a 12-month moving average basis. However, Minnesota's youth unemployment rate stayed high for only a few months, and then dropped quickly as hiring picked up. By December 2021 the youth unemployment rate was 5.4%, the lowest on record going back to 2001, tied with a few months in 2018.
Read the full article.
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 Follow Your Heart to a Caring Career campaign
The Follow Your Heart to a Caring Career campaign launched June 2023 with a proclamation from the Governor explaining the benefits of working in Health Care & Social Assistance. If you're looking for work in a high-demand field, look no further than healthcare. According to DEED's Job Vacancy Survey (JVS), employers in the Twin Cities metro area reported over 25,400 job vacancies in Health Care & Social Assistance in 2022. This accounted for over one-quarter (25.9%) of the region's total job vacancies at that time. While slightly down from its peak number of job vacancies in 2021, the number of job vacancies in Health Care & Social Assistance is up by more than 75% from 2017, showing extreme demand. Read Twin Cities Metro analysis from Tim O'Neill.
State, regional and local workforce development professionals, state agencies and others have joined forces to help employers attract, hire and retain the workforce they need to provide care and support to elders and people with disabilities in Minnesota. This campaign focuses on attracting workers for home-, community-, and facility-based care providers. Paid advertising is directed toward specific audiences, complemented by earned media, organic social, GovDelivery emails and other means. Since launch on June 1, we've had 60,000+ views of Caring Career content on CareerForceMN.com!
Visit the CareerForce website for more information about the Follow Your Heart campaign.
 DEED - Minnesota Posts Another Month of Strong Job Growth as Labor Force Increases Again
Employers added 7,700 jobs in May as more Minnesotans entered the workforce.
Minnesota saw its labor force grow again in May as 8,700 workers entered the job market – the largest over-the-month labor force gain since June 2020 and the third straight month with a labor force increase.
Read DEED article
Annual Business Survey Shows Improvement in Key Areas
Minnesota business services firms are cautiously optimistic about the workforce shortage and inflation easing in the coming year, according to a survey of Minnesota businesses service firms conducted by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) and the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
Read DEED article
DEED's Data Center
DEED on Twitter
CareerForce on Twitter
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