Located in:
- Program-Specific Requirements for Wagner-Peyser Program (Employment Services)
All Program-Specific Requirements provided for the WIOA core programs in this section must be addressed for either a Unified or Combined State Plan.
a. 1. Describe how the State will staff the provision of labor exchange services under the Wagner-Peyser Act, such as through State employees, including but not limited to state merit staff employees, staff of a subrecipient, or some combination thereof.
Current Narrative:
As background information, the Division of Employment Security (DES) under the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations (DOLIR) is primarily responsible for the payment of unemployment insurance (UI) benefits to claimants who are unemployed through no fault of their own and the collection of UI tax contributions from employers. Office of Workforce Development (OWD) which is under the Department of Higher Education and Workforce Development (DHEWD) is responsible for the provision of employment and training services to various populations, including the unemployed.
Labor exchange services under the Wagner-Peyser act in DHEWD continue to be provided solely by non-merit State employees,
Prior to 2018, Missouri’s personnel law, located in chapter 36 of the Missouri Revised Statutes, required that all employees of certain agencies, including the employees of the Office of Workforce Development, have merit status. In 2018, the Missouri legislature amended the state personnel law to remove merit status for all employees except those who are required to be merit by “federal law or regulations for grant-in-aid programs.” 36.030, RSMo. In its revised regulation at 20 CFR 652.215, the USDOL removed the requirement that labor exchange services be provided by State merit-staff and instead provides that W-P funded activities “can be provided through a variety of staffing models. They are not required to be provided by State merit-staff employees.”
Upon publication of this final rule, the Office of Workforce Development had to remove the merit status of all its employees to comply with State of Missouri law. In the State of Missouri, all employees are at-will except when required by federal law. 20 CFR 652.215 no longer requires that W-P funded staff be merit, as a result OWD had to remove the merit status at the earliest possible opportunity to comply with State of Missouri law.
Office of Workforce Development staff was notified June 14, 2021 followed by a detailed presentation on June 16, 2021. Formal letters to employees were then sent to their permanent addresses. Beginning on July 1, 2021, all remaining Missouri merit staff changed to at-will in the payroll system.