Supporting Statement: Unemployment Insurance Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment Grants

Fiscal Year 2017

Unemployment Insurance Reemployment Services

and Eligibility Assessment Grants

Supplemental Justification

Supplemental Supporting Statement A: Justification

This request seeks OMB approval under the Paperwork Reduction Act for the unique information collection requirements in the “Unemployment Insurance Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment,” solicitation. The Department will notify State Workforce Agencies (SWAs) of the request for applications for the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 Unemployment Insurance (UI) Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) grants. Although appropriations for FY 2017 have not been finalized, ETA is issuing this solicitation in anticipation that the total available funding for RESEAs will be similar or equal to the level provided for FY 2016. The awards made under this solicitation will be subject to the availability of Federal funds and may need to be changed if the final FY 2017 appropriation is substantially different from the FY 2016 appropriation.

Since 2005, the U.S. Department of Labor and participating state UI workforce agencies have been addressing individual reemployment needs of UI claimants, and working to prevent and detect UI improper payments, through the voluntary UI Reemployment and Eligibility Assessment program and, beginning in FY 2015, through the voluntary RESEA program. These types of program services have been considered high priorities for the Department’s Employment and Training Administration (ETA). In FY 2016, a total of 50 states and jurisdictions operated a RESEA program.

The intent of RESEAs is to provide claimants with entry to a wide array of available resources that support reemployment and to connect claimants to the direct provision of intensive career services as appropriate. RESEAs were developed to supplement rather than supplant current reemployment activities provided by the integrated workforce system, and requires RESEA participants be enrolled in Wagner-Peyser funded Employment Services as part of the initial RESEA. RESEA programs are designed to be an integral part of states’ strategies for delivering reemployment services. States should develop a career service delivery model to ensure that UI claimants served through the RESEA program receive an appropriate level of service suited to each individual claimant.

The FY 2017 RESEA program will align with Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act’s (WIOA) broader vision of increased program integration and service delivery for job-seekers, including UI claimants, promote greater consistency across states to support future establishment of a mandatory RESEA program, and grow the role of RESEA as an entry-point for UI beneficiaries into other workforce system partner programs, as proposed in the President’s budget. Each RESEA program must include the following minimum components to serve the needs of the claimant: UI eligibility assessment and referral to adjudication, as appropriate, if an issue or potential issue(s) is identified; requirement for the claimant to report to an American Job Center (AJC); orientation to AJC services; the provision of labor market and career information that addresses the claimant’s specific needs; registration with the state’s job bank; enrollment in Wagner-Peyser-funded Employment Services; development or revision of an individual reemployment plan that includes work search activities, accessing services provided through an AJC or using self-service tools, and/or approved training to which the claimant acknowledges agreement; and provision of at least one additional career service.

Applications will include the following information collections: 1) Abstract – Summary of Program 2) Form SF-424 Application for Federal Assistance, OMB control number 4040-0004, 3) Form SF-424A Budget Information Form, OMB control number 4040-0006.

Electronic availability:

This grant solicitation is available on the www.doleta.gov Web site. Based on past DOL experience, the Department anticipates 100 percent of responses will be submitted electronically.

Small Entities:

This information collection will not have a significant impact on a substantial number of small entities.

Assurances of confidentiality:

These grant solicitations do not offer applicants assurances of confidentiality.

Special circumstances:

This solicitation implicates no special circumstances.

Burden:

The DOL expects to receive approximately 54 applications from an equal number of respondents.  The public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 20 hours per response, including time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining needed data, and completing and reviewing the collection of information.

54 applications x 20 hours = 1080 hours

The DOL has increased the average hourly earnings in the professional and business services industry to $30.56 per hour to monetize this burden.  See The Employment Situation—May 2016, DOL, Bureau of Labor Statistics, http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_06032016.pdf at page 33.

1080 hours x $30.56 = $33,004.80

The DOL associates no other burden costs with this information collection. In addition to the application, each grantee will be required to submit quarterly financial, performance, and narrative reports to the ETA. Those information collection requirements will be cleared under a separate control number.

Total burden: 54 respondents, 54 responses, 1080 hours, $0 other cost burden.

Supplemental Supporting Statement B: Statistical Methods

This information collection does not employ statistical methods.

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