Finally A First Source Bill that Can Work!

Reformed DC First Source Jobs Bill clears

Committee on Housing and Workforce Development

Establishing the highest residency hiring requirement in District History

Washington, DC-

Following introduction last January, a public hearing last spring, and over 30 subsequent meetings with diverse constituencies including; the non-profit sector, organized labor, community activists, businesses, and governmental agencies, the Committee on Housing and Workforce Development, chaired by Councilmember Michael A. Brown, At-large, has passed bill B19-50 “District of Columbia Workforce Intermediary Establishment and Reform of First Source and Living Wage Amendment Act of 2011.”

Highlights of the legislation, crafted to place DC residents into DC funded jobs are:

·         Creates a bifurcated policy that preserves the 51% new hire requirement on projects receiving government assistance between $300,000 and $5 million and applies enhanced industry-specific First Source hiring and reporting requirements by total hours worked on projects receiving $5 million or more in government assistance. 

"Total hours worked is much better than the prior Legislation which left so many DC workers out in the cold and encouraged out of city workers to moonlight our jobs."

·         Increases the focus to include projects and services that are not construction related.

·         Strengthens monitoring and compliance by updating reporting requirements, by including additional pro-rated fines for not reaching specific hiring requirements and by providing the Mayor debarment authority for repeat violators. 

"Compliance will be the big battle.  This is where the special interests will try to weaken and hamstring the legislation.  We need to keep up the pressure to assure these well thought out provisions are NOT edited out of this Bill."

·         Allows beneficiaries to double-count hours worked by District residents who are “hard to employ”, whichbenefits the business and the worker.

"An excellent provision as many of our unemployed citizens are "hard-to-employ" and will need full time mentors"

·         Allows beneficiaries to “roll-over” excess hours worked on past projects.

·         Establishes a workforce intermediary pilot program that will coordinate new and existing training opportunities to match job seekers to businesses and projects with job openings.

The Council of the District of Columbia will conduct a first reading of the Reform of First Source bill on Tuesday, November 1, 2011 at their legislative meeting.

For language of the bill, visit- http://dccouncil.us/images/00001/20110121162550.pdf