SRC-JEC H.B. 1348 77(R) BILL ANALYSIS Senate Research Center H.B. 1348 By: Villarreal, Mike (Shapleigh) Business & Commerce 5/9/2001 Engrossed DIGEST AND PURPOSE Child-care facilities are often instrumental in providing early education services to children. These services are crucial not only in fostering positive learning environments for children during their developmental years, but also in enabling the parents of those children to work. In Texas, however, assistance for child-care is limited. H.B. 1348 authorizes the Texas Workforce Commission to make grants available on a one-time basis for local workforce development boards to design and implement initiatives to address regional child-care needs. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY This bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, institution, or agency. SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS SECTION 1. Amends Chapter 302A, Labor Code, by adding Section 302.0041, as follows: Sec. 302.0041. CHILD-CARE DEMONSTRATION PROJECT GRANTS. (a) Authorizes the Texas Workforce Commission (commission) to make grants available on a one-time basis to local workforce development boards to enable the boards to design and implement child-care demonstration projects. (b) Requires a local workforce development board that receives a grant under this section to use the grant to design and implement a demonstration project that meets certain goals. (c) Requires a local workforce development board to meet certain criteria in order to be eligible for a grant under this section. (d) Provides that child-care services that may continue to be funded under Subsection (c)(2) at the conclusion of the demonstration project may be funded through existing local workforce development board resources for child-care services or other local resources. SECTION 2. Effective date: upon passage or September 1, 2001.