HBA-SEP H.B. 1307 77(R)BILL ANALYSIS Office of House Bill AnalysisH.B. 1307 By: Villarreal, Mike Economic Development 7/19/2001 Enrolled BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE The 76th Legislature funded the creation of a statewide network of child care resource and referral agencies through the General Appropriations Act. The bill that would have created the resource and referral network in statute, however, did not pass. Since the 76th legislative session, the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) has awarded funds to the Texas Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies to provide child care data to policy makers, education about early child care and education options to parents, and assistance to employers who want to provide child care benefits to their employees. The Legislative Budget Board has recommended continuing funding to TWC for this purpose during the 2002-2003 biennium. House Bill 1307 establishes a statutory requirement that TWC contract for the provision of a child-care resource and referral network. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that rulemaking authority is expressly delegated to the Texas Workforce Commission in SECTION 1 (Section 310.009, Labor Code) of this bill. ANALYSIS House Bill 1307 amends the Labor Code to require the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) to contract with a child-care resource and referral network (network) to provide child-care resource and referral services through funds allocated to TWC as the agency designated to administer the grant under the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act of 1990. The bill requires TWC, not later than January 1, 2002, to use a system of competitive procurement to award a contract to a network that has proven experience in resource and referral services. To the extent funds from the block grant program are available for that purpose, TWC is required to award the contract in a manner that will allow for the provision of services statewide. The network is required to conduct a needs assessment to determine the supply of and demand for childcare services in this state and to identify discrepancies between that supply and demand. Based on the needs assessment, the network is required to make recommendations to TWC regarding collaborative solutions to the discrepancies. The bill specifies certain entities that must collaborate and recommend solutions. The network, through its members, is required to provide and continually update certain resource information regarding child-care and early education services in this state and assistance in becoming a child-care provider. The bill requires the network to provide referral services to a person who is seeking child-care and early childhood education services and an employer seeking child-care assistance for the employer or an employee. The network is further required to provide referrals to available support services and information for consumers of child-care and early childhood education services. The bill requires the network, through its members, to inform parents, child-care consumers, child-care providers, and employers located in the member's service area of the resource and referral services available from the network and the methods by which a person may contact the member to access resource and referral services. The bill authorizes the member to provide the information through the media and specified alternative means. The network is required, through its members, to collect and continuously update statewide data regarding the supply of and demand for child-care and early childhood education services in this state, report the data to TWC each calendar quarter, and make the information available statewide. The data must include a comprehensive compilation of all available child-care and early childhood education services in this state and information concerning unmet needs of consumers with respect to those services. The bill requires TWC and the Department of Protective and Regulatory Services to provide assistance to the network and members of the network in collecting, aggregating, and updating the data. The bill authorizes TWC to adopt rules necessary to implement the child-care resource and referral network. EFFECTIVE DATE September 1, 2001.