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Committee advances bill to establish health-care workforce grants and an Office of Community Investment
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Summary
The committee adopted amendments to create a codified health-care workforce grant program (no funding this year) and to establish an Office of Community Investment at DEED to provide strategic grant management; community groups testified that demand for training exceeds capacity.
Chairs told the committee that House File 3732, as amended, would establish a new workforce grant program targeting health-care shortages and create an Office of Community Investment inside DEED to coordinate strategic grant-making and legislative priorities.
The health-care workforce grant program in the DE1 amendment would allow DEED to identify specific health-care workforce shortages (for example, certified nursing assistants or rural oncologists) and set priorities for grants. Chairs emphasized the bill codifies the program but does not appropriate money this session; codification, they said, lets agencies issue RFPs and be ready to deploy funds in a subsequent budget cycle.
Community testimony: Maenza Ta, president and CEO of the Hmong American Partnership, urged support for the grant program, saying her organization has "graduated over 300 students, supported nearly 260 industry recognized certifications, and helped participants move into employment at an average wage of $23.50 an hour," and that HAP currently has more than 130 people waiting for training. "The challenge is not interest, the challenge is access," Ta said.
Members discussed siting and access: lawmakers from Greater Minnesota stressed training must be located near where people live to avoid long travel distances that limit enrollment; chairs and sponsors said the Office of Community Investment would help set priorities, document outcomes and coordinate with community partners to reduce duplication and speed fund deployment.
Next steps: the committee adopted the A1 and DE1 amendments to the bill by voice votes and laid the amended bill over for further consideration later in the week.
