Workforce Tulsa is in the workforce solutions business. We help employers solve their workforce development problems. In this challenging economy, we must build an “Environment” where creative businesses and their employees thrive. It means crafting a synergistic relationship between the disciplines of Community Development, Economic Development and Workforce Development. We would like your help in creating a workforce development plan that will help to jump start economic activity in Creek, Osage, Pawnee & Tulsa Counties”.

Our History

One of the major social programs that developed out of the 1960’s “Great Society” legislation was the Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA). One of CETA’s purposes was to assist low income, unskilled people into employment by funding public service employment positions with state, local and tribal governments and a wide variety of public, non-profit organizations.
By 1982, the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) replaced CETA. While the focus on providing training to low income, unskilled workers remained the same, JTPA brought three big changes:

1. Emphasis on private sector, rather public sector employment;
2. The involvement of the business community in planning and oversight of programs; and
3. The “partnership” in JTPA was considered to be the new partnership created between business and local government to administer the program.

By the late 1990’s, an expanded role for the private sector was called for. Several other factors led the U.S. congress to enact reform legislation built upon experience with JTPA:

1. The proliferation of employment and training programs under different federal and state agencies – each with its own regulations, objectives and bureaucracy – was creating a maze of services that confused and frustrated those they were designed to serve when attempting to access them;
2. Labor shortages began to appear in various employment sectors, including skilled areas;
3. Welfare reform adopted a “work first” philosophy, adding a large number of individuals to the workforce and, in many cases, main streaming them through the existing public employment system.

The result was the Workforce Investment Act of 1998 (WIA). WIA mandated that every PIC sunset by July 1, 2000, and be replaced by a Workforce Investment Board, appointed by county board chairs in rural areas and mayors in urban areas, whom the legislation refers to as the Local Elected Officials (LEOs).

Under WIA, the PIC structure is maintained in the form of business-led “Workforce Investment Boards”. These boards now have the added responsibility of strategic planning around local workforce issues and oversight of the “One-Stop” job center system, providing coordinated, customer orientated public employment and training programs. This expands the focus of the WIBs to issues concerning the entire workforce, not just the targeted populations of JTPA.

• Workforce Investment Boards are responsible for
• Oversight of the job center system.
• Certifying Job Centers in their areas
• Appointing One-Stop Operations and service providers
• Certifying appropriate training programs for youth and adults.

In Addition, WIBs set local

• one-stop performance standards and
• are responsible for “connecting, brokering, and coaching” employers, programs, economic development and job seekers thereby, creating a functioning “system” of workforce services.