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MDES asks Appropriations for level FY27 funding, highlights $1.4M SLDS request and staffing changes
Summary
The Mississippi Department of Employment Security told the Appropriations Committee it seeks level FY27 funding with line-item adjustments to reflect current staffing, requests $1.4 million for the State Longitudinal Data System and $400,000 to support Accelerate Mississippi, and expects to finalize ARPA reimbursements by Sept. 30.
Bill Ashley, executive director of the Mississippi Department of Employment Security, told the Appropriations Committee that MDES is seeking level funding for FY27 but wants line-item adjustments to reflect updated staffing and program needs.
Ashley said MDES’s primary programs—Employment Services, Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) programs and unemployment insurance—are federally funded and that the agency is a special fund agency. He asked the committee to approve budget authority that reflects 440 positions (the agency currently has 406 employees, 28 positions in active recruitment and six planned roles) and said MDES will be 13 positions below last year’s authorized headcount of 453.
"We are asking for level spending authorization the same as FY26 but with line-item adjustments to reflect staffing levels," Ashley said, and he described the variance with the committee’s original recommendation as driven mainly by a roughly $1 million increase in salaries and fringe and a roughly $0.5 million decrease in contractual services.
Ashley identified two specific additions in the MDES revised request: $1.4 million for the State Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) and $400,000 to support Accelerate Mississippi as fiscal agent. He told senators the SLDS is the repository of education and employment data for state research, contracts with an outside vendor, acts as a pass-through, and that the $1.4 million is a recurring line item.
Senator Williams asked whether the SLDS funding is recurring; Ashley replied it carries over year to year and is used to contract for research and system maintenance. On staffing, Ashley said MDES is not broadly requesting new "pins" but is asking the committee to restore 22 positions relative to the committee recommendation (bringing the requested headcount from the committee’s 418 up toward the agency’s requested 440) to account for turnover and planned hires.
The MDES presentation also reviewed workforce-related programs administered or supported by the agency, including equipment grants to K–12 through Equip Mississippi, reimbursements under ARPA (Ashley said about $84 million was allocated and roughly $67 million reimbursed to date, leaving about $16 million remaining) and a half‑million-dollar systems and technology line included in the request to support talent solutions and a SWAT team for rapid industry recruitment and training.
Ashley said MDES had shifted some internal audit/monitoring costs back to program funds, lowering the contractual-services request in general funds, and described travel and commodity line items as unchanged from the prior year.
The presentation closed with MDES staff offering to provide committee members with any further detail needed on specific line items or position counts. The agency did not propose any formal motions or votes during the hearing.
